


Trust is a Dark Art

by hizziesmemori



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Ableism, Alternate Universe - Hogwarts, Angst, Betrayal, Bullying, F/M, Falling In Love, First Kiss, Fluff, Hogwarts AU, Minor Clarke Griffin/Lexa, Minor Monty Green/Harper McIntyre, Minor Violence, Plot Twists, Slow Burn, Snowed In, Trauma, also if you’re a josephine stan, an overarching plot, but magical dorks, but shes lowkey in character, but they love each other - Freeform, if you’re a bellamy stan look away, memori being dorks, memori is bad at feelings, not THAT slow burn really, remori in later chapters, slytherin centered
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-14
Updated: 2021-03-14
Packaged: 2021-03-15 20:27:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 25,077
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29441880
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hizziesmemori/pseuds/hizziesmemori
Summary: Emori knew nothing about magic or fitting in. Murphy seemed to fit in too well. Could they learn to trust each other? To love each other? Could they save the Wizarding World from danger?This story follows Murphy and Emori’s growing relationship with each other throughout their 7 years of Hogwarts, and all of the awkwardness, love, heartbreak, and evil they face along the way.
Relationships: Bellamy Blake/John Murphy, Emori/John Murphy (The 100), Emori/Raven Reyes
Comments: 16
Kudos: 25





	1. Year 1

**Author's Note:**

> Hi!! This is my second fic, but it’s my first like long fic instead of being a one shot. Sorry this first chapter is so long, there’s a lot of exposition so the other chapters won’t be as long.
> 
> I hope you enjoy!!

**Year 1**

**Emori**

Hundreds of eyes pierced Emori’s back as she approached the stool, her head held so far down that she was staring at the black straps of her new shoes. She subconsciously thanked herself for remembering to keep her left hand stuffed into the pocket of her robe, not that it would have made a difference. The weight of their stares might have weighed her down on a different day, but today they felt inconsequential balanced against the weight of the hat sitting on the stool.

She stopped in front of Professor McGonagall, refusing to lift her eyes. 

The hall was filled with anxious new students and exasperated old ones, slid neatly into long tables already adorned with dinner plates. And yet, the vast room was so quiet that you couldn’t hear a pin drop onto the pristine floor.

_You aren’t even fit to walk on it,_ she thought with a grimace.

The stiff professor lifted the hat from the stool so Emori could take a seat on it, which she did shakily.

Finally, she worked up the courage to lift her gaze and stare back out into the sea of students. All huddled up with their friends and wearing unwrinkled robes and watching her with an expression that she knew all too well. She didn’t belong here.

Too late now, she scoffs to herself as the heavy hat is placed onto her dark hair.

Emori closes her eyes, clutching the end of the stool with her right hand. The hat laughs at her.

_Now aren’t you an enigma?_

Oh, she knows it.

_So shy I might peg you for a Hufflepuff… But you have as much loyalty as a scurrying rat, don’t you?_

Emori flinched, but did not answer.

_So intuitive, but without instruction… So courageous, but without chivalry… So cunning… Yes, that’s it. Cunning. Tricky. Clever girl. Yes, yes, I know just where to put you._

“Slytherin!” 

The Slytherin table clapped, but it felt more like a courtesy than an act of enthusiasm. The second the condescending hat was off of her head, Emori rushed from the stool to the table of her assigned house. The eyes on her back felt heavier now.

She took a seat at the very front of the expansive table, where it seemed no older student wanted to sit because of the crowd of first years standing around the area. Sitting alone didn’t bother her. It was better this way.

It seemed to Emori that names flew off McGonagall’s list quicker than they had before. A fierce eyed girl named Lexa was in Gryffindor. A dark haired boy named Monty was in Hufflepuff. A curious girl named Raven was, funnily enough, in Ravenclaw.

A boy with curly hair and a haughty smirk laughed with his friends as he ran up to the stool. The hat barely touched a hair on his head.

“Slytherin!”

The cheers that erupted from her table were nothing like the halfhearted claps that Emori had received. The boy leaped off the stool and hit his unsorted friend on the shoulder as he ran to the Slytherin table, where he was met with high fives from the upperclassmen.

“Let’s go, Bellamy!” 

“Nice going, Blake.”

“The hat didn’t even hesitate!”

It had for her. Not that she would’ve had friends to greet her if it hadn’t.

The next student up was the boy Emori recognized as being the friend Bellamy had hit after he was sorted. He didn’t seem nearly as confident about his turn, though.

Noises died down from each table as the boy left the crowd, his gaze focused in a hard stare on the stool. Emori studied his movements briefly, the way his hands toyed with the edges of his robe, the way he let his hair fall over his eyes as he looked up at McGonagall, the way he hesitated before taking his place on the stool.

The boy looked out into the mass of people just as she had as the hat was deposited onto his droopy hair. His eyes were icy blue, a mysterious kind of blue that you couldn’t quite read. She caught his eye, just for a moment before she broke the stare. He didn’t look away as quickly.

There was something lonely about him, she thought, despite him clearly having friends. When she met his eyes for that brief moment, there was something like desolation in his gaze. It drew her to him.

After about thirty seconds of deliberation, the hat seemed to make its decision. Emori saw the boy’s relieved smile before she heard the house called.

“Slytherin!”

Another loud round of applause rang out (not quite as loud as his friend’s) and the boy smirked as he hopped from the stool and made his way to the Slytherin table. 

If he stopped in front of her as he approached the head of the table, she didn’t even notice, encapsulated by his eyes meeting hers again. 

He must have, though, because then Bellamy was shouting, “What’s the hold up, Murphy? I saved you a seat!”

_Murphy. That’s a strange name._

Emori didn’t have time to dwell on it, though, as he swooped past her to meet his friends at the back end of the table. She winced at the disappointed sigh she released when he was out of her vision. 

_You know better._

One of her nails absentmindedly traced a crack on the wooden table as she watched the crowd dwindle, filtering into their houses like it’s what they’d been waiting their whole lives.

-

It was, in fact, what they’d been waiting for their whole lives, she soon discovered. 

When dinner had arrived after the sorting ceremony, Emori had scarfed down food like a madman, much to the distaste of her peers, it seemed. She hadn’t minded at the time; the array of food laid out before her was quite frankly more food than she’d seen in her entire life.

As she entered the Slytherin common room that evening, however, the weight of her differences were suddenly more apparent on her shoulders. 

The room was packed with students, each of them sitting around talking (more like yelling, in her opinion) in their little circles. It seemed like they all had known each other practically since they were born, and though rowdy, the atmosphere of the room felt private, like it was some exclusive club she wasn’t allowed into.

Emori’s Hogwarts letter found her on the street. She had been ducked behind a building observing a thin leather wallet and set of keys she had pickpocketed earlier that day, when seemingly out of nowhere a gust of wind rushed through and revealed a sealed letter at her feet.

As the nimble fingers of her right hand had broken the red seal, an odd feeling washed over her that she couldn’t quite place. 

Now, she thought that it was hope. 

_There’s no such thing._

Emori shook both thoughts out of her head as she rushed past the busyness of the common room to the girls’ dormitory, where she could hopefully spend some time alone.

This was easier said than done, it appeared.

The first year girls’ dormitory was a large room with clean, four post beds circling the perimeter. Like the whole Slytherin dungeon, it seemed, the room was freezing cold with a luminous green glow drenching the whole space. And to her dismay, it was not empty.

By process of elimination, Emori figured that the bed with no less than 4 girls crowding on and around it was not hers, so she circled the room awkwardly as she looked for a bed with her name on it.

There wasn’t one.

A tinge of panic hit her chest as she double checked the remaining beds, having the same bad luck as before. Of course there wasn’t a bed for her, she thought sourly. 

_You don’t belong here._

Eyes filled with defeat and the beginnings of tears, Emori turned her attention to the crowded bed. She could ask them for help. They would know what to do in this situation more than she ever would. She could just ask them-

Her thoughts stopped abruptly as she spotted the golden label on the occupied bed. 

**Emori**

The questions that filled her head in that moment were overshadowed by a feeling of bitterness as she approached her bed. The girls were distracted, chatting and laughing about something sitting on the bed that Emori couldn’t see, so they didn’t seem to hear the clicking of her shoes as she neared them.

She tapped the girl closest to her on the shoulder, causing her to whip her head around and face her. Upon their friend turning around, the other girls seemed to realize what was happening and scrambled to get off the bed and stop touching the item sitting in the middle, which Emori now had a clear view of.

It was her trunk.

A dark haired girl to her left broke the silence. “We are _so_ sorry, Emori.” Except she didn’t look even a little sorry, and she pronounced her name wrong.

“We’ve just never seen anything like this before, we were curious…” Another girl piped up, looking at least a little more empathetic, but also slightly scared.

_Of course she’s scared of you. Look at your hand._

As it turns out, most of the girls were looking at her hand. She cursed herself in her head for not remembering to keep it in her robe pocket, where she quickly shoved it now.

Threat partially averted, Emori snapped back to reality. “Like what?”

“Well this is yours, isn’t it?” A blonde girl said impatiently, gesturing to the trunk. “So, what, the school gave you all this used trash because you’re broke and couldn’t afford school supplies? Did they give you the ugly robes, too?”

“Josie!” The first girl scolded her friend, but it appeared as though she was holding back laughter herself.

The girl named Josie was, to tell the truth, correct. 

When Emori had opened the sealed Hogwarts letter, she laughed at the first mention of wizards and looked around the sides of the building to see who was playing a prank on her. There was no one there.

Confused, she continued reading the letter, raising her eyebrows at the ridiculousness of her being accepted into a magical school. Under the acceptance note, a list of uniform requirements and school supplies had been crossed out with the words “Don’t worry about this!” written to the side in hasty handwriting.

At the bottom, written in the same scratchy handwriting, was an address that led her to an alleyway behind a pub with instructions on how to enter the wizarding world.

In hindsight, following directions from a mysterious letter wasn’t her greatest survivor's move, but it brought her here.

Here, to a Wizarding school where the administration left her a trunk of used school supplies on her bed, and a bunch of rich girls were making fun of her for it.

She should’ve known there would be a catch.

Emori held eye contact with the blonde girl as she forced a saccharine smile. “Yeah, you’re right. It’s mine.”

Josie smirked, claiming her victory. Emori didn’t know how to properly use the wand sitting in her robe pocket yet, but she figured hitting her over the head with it would do the trick.

_If you start a fight, they’ll throw you back on the streets. Everyone already knows you don’t belong here._

Closing the violated trunk and placing it on the floor, she climbed into her bed and pulled the covers over her. The girls seemed to take the hint that the fun was over and began to walk away.

“Daddy’s girl.” Emori muttered, refusing to hand over the win.

One of the girls giggled. Josie shot her a look that seemed to shut her up.

“Whatever,” Josie scoffed. “At least I’m not a poor freak. Some of us are actually supposed to be here, you know.”

With that, she turned on her heel to make her way back to the common room. As the other girls walked with her, Emori listened absentmindedly to their new topic of conversation, resting her head into the pillow warily.

“I think Bellamy’s in the common room.”

“Why does it matter?”

“Because Clarke totally has a crush on him.”

“No I don’t!”

“Oh, you so do…”

Those were the last words Emori heard before she drifted to sleep in her new bed.

-

When she awoke, the dorm was pitch black. Emori sat up and searched around her space for any indication of the time, only vaguely aware in her sleepy state that she didn’t own a watch.

Slowly, she stepped out of bed, cringing at the sound of her shoes clicking the floor. After removing them, and also her outer layer of school robes, she proceeded across the dormitory to the door that led back to the common room. 

Upon the discovery that the hallway from her dorm as well as the common room were completely dark and empty, Emori supposed that her nap had extended well into the night. She felt around one of the common room tables for a matchbox, instead finding a lone match that she struck against the table. Using magic must be more popular than matches, she guessed.

Lighting a few candles around the common room, Emori took her time exploring the area. She liked it a lot better empty. 

The room was filled with strategically placed leather couches and chairs with tables scattered around that contained unfinished chess games and books that strayed from a large bookshelf encased in one of the walls. The source of the green glow soaking the whole dungeon was the decorated windows all around the room that reached nearly all the way to the ceiling. 

Emori finished her exploration of the room at the opposite edge, where the door leading to the boys’ dormitory lived. As she turned away from this door to head back to her own dorm, she noticed a trunk sitting on one of the chairs, hidden by the adjacent table.

Moving the chair slightly so she could have better access to the trunk, she ran her finger over the smooth leather covering the box. It was much nicer than the wooden one the school had provided her.

Her finger stopped on a cold metal plate on the trunk, feeling an engraving etched into it with her fingertips. Emori grabbed a candle she had lit on a nearby table to examine the panel.

It was gold, and the engraving on it was a name.

**John**

Emori considered her options. On one, smarter hand, she could leave the trunk where it is and go back to sleep. This was the safest choice, she decided.

Unfortunately, Emori had never been a big fan of safety. This is why she popped open the clasps of the trunk, holding the candle over it to search around the inside.

She was, and always had been, a thief, after all. And in order for her to have the most success in this school, she needed to fit in. So what was the harm in stealing from one of these snobby rich kids to get herself some better school supplies? They could always ask their parents for more pocket change.

Speaking of pocket change, Emori grinned as her left hand diligently removed a small sack of coins from the trunk. Placing the candle onto the table, she opened the pouch and examined the loot. 

She didn’t know much about wizard money, but she figured that the large, gold coins she found inside were worth something. Holding the pouch in her left hand, she pulled out one of the coins with her right and inspected it under the candlelight. It had the word “galleon” written on it.

“Whatcha doing?”

Startled by the voice, Emori dropped the coin she had been studying onto the table with a clang. Slowly, she picked up her candle and turned around to face the voice.

She couldn’t see his face very well in the dim light, but his presence was familiar to her somehow. She stumbled over her words.

“I was just- uh-”

As she was formulating her excuse, the boy removed his wand from his robe pocket and walked over to the large fireplace. “Incendio,” he said, pointing his wand at the unlit fireplace.

With that, the common room sprung to life with firelight, and Emori could see the boy’s face more clearly.

It was the boy from the sorting ceremony, Murphy.

“I was just looking through my trunk for something.” Emori decided as Murphy strolled back over to her.

He seemed amused. “That’s your trunk?”

Reserved and decidedly unamused, she folded her arms across her chest, the pouch still clutched in her left hand. “Yes.” 

“Are you sure that’s your trunk?” Murphy was grinning now. She held her ground.

“Yes.” 

Maintaining his smirk, he came closer to her, circling around the chair to look at the object in question. 

“Then why,” he said slowly, placing his finger on the gold plate of the trunk, “does it have my name on it?”

Emori swallowed, following his finger to the engraving. It still read, “John”.

“I thought your name was Murphy,” she choked out, attempting to sustain her confident tone.

“That’s my last name, everyone just calls me by it. My first name is John.” He kept his finger on his name carved into the trunk. His trunk.

_You’re done for._

John’s eyes moved to her hand, which still contained his pouch of money. To be fair, it wasn’t the worst reason for staring at her left hand.

Begrudgingly admitting defeat, Emori reached down to the table to place the dropped coin back into the sack and held it out for him to take. He did take it, placing the pouch back into his trunk, but oddly not paying any attention to the deformity of her hand.

“Please don’t tell anyone about this.”

_Great, you’re begging for mercy now. Coward._

John looked back up at her, meeting her eyes. He shrugged. “Okay.”

Emori blinked at how easily agreed. He must want something from her. “Really?”

“Yeah, I won’t tell,” he returned, closing the clasps of his trunk. “ _If_ you tell me why you were trying to steal my money.”

There it is.

“Why do you care?” Her voice broke as she delivered the quick remark. There goes confidence.

His smirk was back, and Emori looked away so she didn’t have to witness the smugness on his face as he answered.

“I like to know who I’m defending.”

She met his eyes again. “I’m a student, just like you.”

“A student who steals from other students.”

Emori sighed, rubbing her hand over her eye absentmindedly. Honestly, all she wanted was to go back to sleep, but she couldn’t until this situation was taken care of.

“I just needed the money, okay?”

“For what?”

He was better at this than she was.

“I just wanted to get some school supplies.”

“School supplies?” John repeated incredulously. “Did your parents not buy you any?”

“I don’t have parents.” She answered quickly.

That threw him off his rhythm. Point for Emori.

“They threw me out onto the streets to die when I was a baby,” she held up her left hand. “Couldn’t handle their daughter being a freak.”

In the back of her mind, Emori knew she shouldn’t be telling him this, but the words slipped out of her mouth before she could think about it. Whether she was trying to milk her sympathy card or if it was the understanding glazing his eyes coaxing out her secrets, she couldn’t be sure.

“You’re not a freak,” John was quick to reply. “I mean, I don’t see why anyone would think that. I think it’s pretty badass.”

The words felt genuine, but didn’t sit right with her. 

“Liar.” She said it in a joking tone, but she meant it. “Besides, try telling that to the other Slytherin girls. Or that getting used supplies from the school’s pity committee isn’t a big deal.”

_You’re oversharing. We can’t trust him._

Emori didn’t trust John. She was just garnering sympathy so he would let her go, that’s all.

So why was there a flutter in her chest when he told her that her hand was badass? No one has ever complimented her hand before, not even her brother before he-

_No one would ever truly compliment it. He’s manipulating you._

John looked at her with soft eyes. Her heart stuttered.

“Yeah, yeah I get it. A lot of people here suck, right?”

Emori nodded, but without meeting his gaze. She wouldn’t fall for his trap, whatever it was.

“I won’t tell anyone.”

Her resolve not to look at him was short lived. His blue eyes bored into her, and she almost wanted to believe the genuinity in them. But she couldn’t.

“Thanks, John.” 

Emori didn’t wait for a response before she ran back to the girls’ dormitory, her brain confused but her heart pulsing with something she had never felt before.

-

In the morning, John bumped into her as she was walking to the dining hall for breakfast.

Later, back in her dorm, she would discover a pouch of six gold galleons in her robe pocket.


	2. Year 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Murphy is being pushed to try out for the quidditch team, but he has a bigger goal in mind for his second year of Hogwarts.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi guys!! I hope you guys like the new chapter :)   
> A few things-  
> 1\. I know I said this chapter would be shorter than the first one but I accidentally made it twice as long lol (I really need an editor) so sorry about that!  
> 2\. Just to clear something up, I know Bellamy is older in the show, but for my purposes he’s in the same year as everyone else
> 
> Okay that’s it! I hope you enjoy the chapter!

**Year 2**

**Murphy**

Murphy awoke to a loud voice and an extra weight on his bed.

“Wake up, Murphy! This is important!”

Opening his eyes, he registered the curly haired annoyance sitting over him, barely visible through the rays of sunlight forcing him to squint. He groaned and rolled over, tugging the covers over his head to escape the ambush.

“Go away, Bell. We don’t have class this morning.”

That was met with a smack to his head. He surrendered begrudgingly, sitting up to face his friend.

Or, more accurately, a piece of parchment. 

“Quidditch tryouts are this week! When we’re not in class, we need to be practicing.” Bellamy chided as he shoved the parchment into his friend’s chest.

Murphy sighed and examined the crinkled flyer in his hand.

**Slytherin Quidditch Trials  
Wednesday, September 15  
At 17:00  
Open Positions: 1 Keeper and 1 Chaser**

He looked up at Bellamy with a raised eyebrow. “There are only two spots open,” Murphy deadpanned.

“Yeah, and there’s two of us.” Bellamy snatched the flyer back and looked at it excitedly. “Plus, some of the current members may fumble and lose their spot. That’s where underdogs like us swoop in.” His last point was punctuated with a jab to Murphy’s shoulder.

Exasperated, Murphy collapsed back onto his pillow and curled under the covers. As nice as it was that Bellamy thought he could make the team with him, Murphy had always been shit at flying. Especially in comparison to his friend, not to mention-

“Aren’t Echo and Roan trying out?” he mumbled from under his blanket. He could feel his friend’s irritation without even looking at him.

“We’re better than Echo and Roan.”

Murphy nearly laughed. “Maybe you are. You should focus on training yourself to get one of their spots instead of wasting your time on me. I’m a lost cause, Blake.”

Sunlight assaulted his eyes once again as Bellamy tore the blanket off of him, eyes softer than before.

“You’re not a lost cause, Murph… besides, it’ll be no fun to be on the team without you. Can’t you at least try?”

Inwardly, Murphy was willing to admit that he’d been detached from things that used to excite him lately. Lately was a rather light term for it, actually, since it had been going on for years now, but he would never admit that there was a problem, especially not to Bellamy. Things were just different now, he wouldn’t understand. Still, Murphy thought wearily, he owed it to his friend to give it a shot, considering what a pain he’s been ever since-

“Fine, but don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

-

As much of a pain that Murphy was, it was nothing compared to the pain racking his body after quidditch practice with Bellamy.

Trudging through the courtyard from the quidditch pitch to get to his potions class (which was right next to the Slytherin common room anyway, he thought sourly), Murphy considered why he even bothered humouring Bellamy. To spare his feelings, sure, but he was beginning to wonder if his indulgence would hurt his friend in the long run.

He could never be the same boy that Bellamy became friends with.

After the deaths of his parents, Murphy was put into foster care, which was a wildly undeveloped system in the English wizarding world due to the lack of children to put in it. In short, it went like this: He stayed at the foster home for two months initially. He was placed into the care of a shitty woman, and lashed out at her neglect by setting her kitchen on fire. He was put back into the foster home and grounded from being fostered for a while, and when that rule was lifted, Murphy was immediately adopted by Thelonious Jaha, which is where he’s lived for the last 3 years.

This wouldn’t be too bad- Jaha was loaded, he had a high position in the Ministry- except for the fact that he saw his adopted child as merely something broken that he could fix. Though Jaha would never admit it, it was soon apparent to Murphy that he was seen as a project more than a person, with his adoptive father constantly preaching to him and making him do extra jobs to “strengthen his character”. Not to mention, the man was completely preoccupied with his annoyingly perfect biological son.

“Hey, Murphy, wait up!”

Speak of the devil.

“What do you want, Wells?” Murphy sighed as he turned the corner into the hallway leading to his classroom, irked when the other boy caught up with him.

Wells slowed for a moment as he dug in his bag for something, not pleased after he unearthed it to find Murphy hadn’t waited for him. “Dad sent us an owl this morning.” 

He held up the already unsealed letter for exhibition. Murphy didn’t spare a glance at it.

“He’s not my dad, and the letter was clearly for you.”

“Come on, don’t be bitter, there’s a message for you in it.” Wells returned, removing the piece of parchment from its envelope.

In his opinion, Murphy had seen enough unwanted pieces of parchment today.

Still, he plucked the letter from the other boy’s hands, more to get him off his back than because he was actually interested. The parchment was almost completely taken up by Jaha’s note to Wells, with a small message for him to pass to Murphy at the bottom.

**Tell John that I wish him luck on his Quidditch journey. If he makes the team, I will purchase him a new broom. Make sure he knows that this is under the stipulation that he is well behaved and succeeding in his classes.**

“Fascinating,” Murphy deadpanned, shoving the letter back into the boy’s chest. “How did he know I’m trying out?”

“Probably talked to Ms. Blake. Everyone knows Bellamy has been bouncing off the walls about it.”

Murphy winced at the thought of Jaha talking to Aurora Blake. He had been friends with Bellamy for as long as he could remember, but ever since he was adopted Murphy had spent more time at the Blake residence than Jaha’s (creepy) house. Bellamy and his mother and sister felt like a second family to him, and he did not need Jaha’s stuck up ass ruining that for him, too.

A sigh of relief escaped him when they finally approached the potions classroom. “This is my stop, nerd. Next time your dad sends you an owl, feel free to not show it to me, ‘cause I don’t care.”

He didn’t wait for Wells’ response before entering the dimly lit classroom. Like the Slytherin common room adjacent to it, the potions classroom was freezing cold, and Murphy kicked himself for not changing into something warmer under his robes after training.

On top of the classroom’s subpar conditions, this period had a mix of Slytherins and Ravenclaws poured into it, which meant that he was always going to be shown up by the big headed overachievers in front of Professor Snape. Not that he necessarily cared about Snape’s opinion of him, but he was notoriously nicer to Slytherins than students from other houses, and was, in Murphy’s opinion, the least irritating teacher in the school.

However, he wasn’t about to get grumpy about the situation, because despite all this, there was one good thing about his potions class this year: the girl sitting in the front row.

Taking a seat in the back next to Raven, he snuck a glance at the dark haired girl in front of him, who was currently eminently focused on the textbook she had her nose in. 

Murphy, to his chagrin, didn’t know all too much about Emori. The only time they had ever really talked was on the first day of school last year, when she had tried to steal from his trunk in the middle of the night. He quickly noticed as the year progressed that, despite his effort to help by slipping some galleons into her pocket, Emori had no friends. 

He knew why, of course. Josephine Lightbourne was a coldhearted bitch who told everyone that would listen that the other girl was dirt poor, and the only reason she had been invited to Hogwarts in the first place was because Dumbledore felt bad about leaving a “monster freak” like her on the streets. Those nicknames were ones he heard a lot last year, even in his own circle of friends.

The rumours and names meant nothing to Murphy, though. From the moment he met eyes with her in the crowd of the sorting ceremony, something had drawn him in. Laced in those inquisitive, dark eyes was some kind of sorrow, some kind of loneliness- the kind he had endured for years now. His meeting with her in the common room that night had only confirmed what he suspected in that first glimpse: that she-

A book hitting him in the shoulder snapped him back to reality. “Quit staring at her, dumbass. You look like a weirdo.”

Okay, maybe it was a little longer than just a glance, Murphy thought sheepishly. Not that he would admit that.

“Shut up, Reyes,” he snapped, pulling out a roll of parchment and a quill from his bag. “I was just looking at the board.”

The board in question was blank.

Raven snorted. “Have you tried, I don’t know, talking to her?”

Murphy had, in fact, tried that. About seven times over the course of last year, if he was counting.

The issue was always the same: _his_ friends. Not that they necessarily interfered, because they didn’t have to. Their existence was enough, really.

To set one thing straight- Murphy was _not_ friends with Josephine Lightbourne. Bellamy was. And so was Miller. And Mbege. And Lincoln, and- okay, basically all of his friends. But _he_ was not.

Not that it mattered much when Josephine herself thought of him as her friend, and seemed to think the reason he was so salty to her was because he had a crush on her. Which he obviously didn’t, because how would that even make sense?

None of this really seemed that important to him, though, until he tried talking to Emori for the first time after their meeting. Her exact words, if he remembered correctly, were “I know your friends told you to talk to me as a joke, okay? Thanks for the money, but leave me alone.” 

That wasn’t the case, clearly, but he wondered how many times that _had_ happened to her.

It wasn’t always like that time, though. Sometimes Bellamy would follow him around the corner and she would walk away before he even got to say anything to her. Or Josephine and her pure disregard for personal space would hook her arm in his before he could get close to the girl he actually wanted to talk to. And maybe talking to her alone in a classroom setting would have been ideal, except he hadn’t had a single class with her without one of his friends being in it, too. Needless to say, last year was a disaster in the Emori category.

This year would be different. He finally had a class with her that was free of his obnoxious friends, and he was sitting in it right now. For ninety minutes on Mondays and Thursdays, he was golden.

Speaking of class, it had started without him, apparently. Blinking himself back into real life, Murphy scrambled to follow Snape’s lecture and scribble down the notes on the now filled up board. 

And when that inevitably failed, he copied Raven’s.

“What’s happening?” he whispered to his friend, trying not to make it too obvious he was daydreaming again.

Raven was still polishing up her perfect notes. “He’s about to assign us a project, I think.”

“On the second week of school? Overkill.” Murphy groaned back quietly, rolling his eyes.

“Is there a problem, Mr. Murphy?” Snape’s monotone, but still somehow intimidating, voice echoed off the walls of the dark room. 

Okay, not as quietly as he thought, apparently.

“No, sir. I was just asking Raven for an extra quill.” He displayed this by plucking the quill she was currently writing with out of her hand. She shot him a nasty look.

Snape hummed skeptically, but luckily continued with his lesson without further probing. Raven snatched her quill back and mumbled something he couldn’t make out (not that he wanted to, he thought, based on her bitter tone). 

When he looked back up to the front of the room, Murphy could have sworn he saw dark locks of hair whipping around to face the board, too. The thought of her looking at him made him smile a bit, even if it was just because of his goofiness. Hope was not all lost.

“If all questions and _comments_ are out of the way,” Snape remarked as he finished his lecture, looking straight at Murphy for a moment as he said it. “I will now assign you your partners.”

This earned a round of groans from the entire class. 

Murphy leaned over to Raven. “Dang, I was planning on throwing the whole thing on you.” 

“What a shame.” She chuckled and nudged him in the arm.

Snape ignored the class’s objections and produced a long piece of parchment, which he began listing partnerships off of. He seemed to go as slow as possible just to put everyone on edge.

“Raven Reyes and Finn Collins.”

Raven threw her head back and groaned in disappointment. Murphy snorted.

“And so the love story begins…” Murphy teased, gesturing over at Finn, who seemed satisfied with the partnership.

Raven smacked him in the shoulder again, this time not as teasingly. “Would you shut up Mu-”

“John Murphy and Emori.”

Murphy could hardly control the grin that overtook his face in that moment. This was perfect.

If she snuck a glance back at him after their names were called, he didn’t even notice with how excited he was. Murphy was finally going to get an actual chance to talk to her alone, the way they did on the first night that they met. Then she would see that he wasn’t like his friends that she rightfully hated. He understood her, and he was convinced that she understood him as well. If there was truly a piece missing in his life, Emori was it. He was sure of it.

By the time Snape finished listing partners, Murphy had his things packed and was ready to go talk to Emori about the project. 

“Your completed potion will be due by your class on Thursday, where we will test them for accuracy. I do not endorse the implementation of testing your potion on yourself, your partner, or any other student, but do keep in mind that if your potion does not succeed in its purpose you will receive a failing mark.” Snape said this in such a monotonous voice that one had to wonder if he actually did endorse testing potions on students.

As soon as the toll of the bell tower signaling the end of class rang in his ears, Murphy sprung up from his seat to approach Emori at the front of the classroom. She was still seated, placing supplies back into her bag slowly. This was something he had noticed about her last year- she always waited for everyone to exit the classroom before she did. Maybe one day he’d find out why.

Trying for casual, Murphy sat on the table beside her seat. “So, we’re partners then.”

He was usually better at nonchalance, he thought.

“Yeah, I guess we are.” She didn’t look at him, eyes trained on her bag. His heart tore a little at her indifference, but he persisted.

“Uh, so, when are you free to work on it?” There was a crack in his voice as he asked it, and he kicked himself internally. There goes casual.

Seemingly out of things to put in her bag as an excuse, Emori met his eyes. They were the same as they always were- deep, mysterious, lonely- but they held a different weight than before. For some reason, Murphy couldn’t read what it was.

“I have another project due tomorrow and a test on Wednesday I’ll need to study for. Do you think we can cram it on Wednesday night?” 

Murphy’s smile came unconsciously. He would have to wait a few more days, but he would get all of Wednesday night to hang out with her. It was perfect, except-

“I have quidditch tryouts on Wednesday night,” he thought out loud. 

Emori bit her lip, and he could see she was trying to think of another solution, but he already thought of one. 

“You could come,” he blurted out. That was not the way he planned to say it in his head, but he continued just the same. “To the tryouts, I mean. It’s at 5 o’clock, and it’ll be like an hour, or even less maybe, and then when it’s over we can just get straight to work and I won’t have to track you down or anything.”

Subconsciously, Murphy knew he sounded like a stumbling idiot, but for whatever reason he kept rambling to her, “And, I mean, plenty of people come. It's not like it’s a private event, you know? You can just sit on the bleachers and read a book, or you know, you could watch, if you want. You don’t have to watch. I’m not very good, actually, you probably shouldn’t watch.”

Finally, Murphy found the power to shut his mouth, and he tried not to stare at her while he waited for her response. Which, with the way he just babbled to her, would most likely be, “You are such a loser.” He wouldn’t blame her if it was.

After a moment of consideration, Emori grinned. He wasn’t sure if he’d ever seen her smile before, but for some reason, the sight sent a pang to his chest.

“Sounds good. I’ll be there, and we can work on the project afterwards.” She put her bag over her shoulder, and he took that as his signal to hop off the table he was sitting on. They stood there for a few seconds, facing each other awkwardly, neither really knowing what to do.

“Okay, great.” Murphy said, put off by the tension between them. He swore it had never been this way before.

“Great.” She repeated, and after a few more seconds of silence, brushed past him to leave the classroom. 

Murphy followed her out, probably smiling like an idiot, but he didn’t care. In two days, everything would change.  
-

The air around him buzzed with excitement and anxiety as Murphy mindlessly followed Bellamy onto the quidditch pitch. That, and, the beginning of rain, it seemed as he gazed up at the cloudy gray sky looming over them. In the middle of the vast field, the current Slytherin team stood proudly as the new candidates rolled in, each seeming as determined as the next. Murphy tugged nervously at the borrowed green jersey he had on, feeling almost embarrassed to be wearing it. He didn’t belong here, and it showed.

Bellamy, on the other hand, was teeming with enthusiasm. Murphy wished some of it would rub off on him, just to get him through this hour.

“This is so cool!” his friend raved, wrapping an arm around Murphy’s shoulder tightly. It almost comforted him.

You’re doing this for him, Murphy reminded himself as he placed his hand on Bellamy’s back. The feeling was nostalgic, in a way. 

“Hey, guys!” called a new voice, who, upon turning around, Murphy identified as Echo. “You going out for chaser too, Bellamy?”

The boy in question crossed his arms cockily, seemingly not amused. “Yeah, I am. And I’m gonna get it too.”

Maybe he had just never paid close enough attention to their dynamic, but Murphy actually didn’t know why Bellamy hated Echo. In his limited purview of her, she seemed nice. However, when he brought this up to Bellamy, he made him swear never to say it again. 

Echo laughed and began turning away from them, which Murphy could see was because Roan had just stepped onto the field looking twice as confident as Bellamy. Now _that_ was someone he understood his friend’s hatred for.

“Well, good luck then Bellamy! You too, Murphy!” Echo shouted as she ran over to meet her friend. 

Bellamy rolled his eyes. “Can you believe her? She’s such a-“

“Alright! New guys, come line up over here!” Anya, the current Slytherin captain, yelled to the far side of the field. 

Murphy laughed at Bellamy’s sour face as he was interrupted, following him as he ran to the center of the field where Anya and the rest of the team stood. 

With all the new contenders lined up next to him, Murphy wondered why they even bothered to be here in the first place. Surely they all knew what he knew- Echo and Roan were going to take the spots. Anybody else (including Bellamy, he thought sadly), were just fooling themselves and begging for scraps of a completed team.

Anya explained the tryout system to them, which was that they would mix the current team with the new candidates, and then split them up into two teams so they could run drills. There were too many people trying out, so they would have to sub people in and out as they went along. 

Because of Bellamy’s adamance to be a chaser, who tried to score points by hitting balls called quaffles into the giant gold hoops on either end of the field, it was obvious that Murphy would be going out for keeper, who blocked the quaffles from going into the hoops.

Murphy was actually disappointed to be put on Bellamy’s team for the tryouts, because he was planning to deliberately be awful at guarding the hoops so that Bellamy could score more points. Now, his goal had changed- he had to block more scores than Roan.

This should be fun.

Shakily putting on his helmet and mounting his broom, he soared into the air and took his place in front of the hoop on his team’s side. 

As horrible as he was at flying, which was apparent by how the broom was quivering under his uncontrolled hand, it did feel incredible to be up in the air like this. The sky was white and dotted with dark clouds, but the atmosphere was calm and peaceful. If he closed his eyes and pretended that this was all there was, he almost felt free.

From his position at the hoop, Murphy could easily stare out into the large bleachers on the side of the pitch, where he spotted a figure that made his breath shake. He almost forgot that he had invited Emori to the tryouts, but there she was, sitting isolated on the top row of the bleachers, looking admittedly adorable in her green and silver striped scarf that served as a pillow for her dark hair.

Why did he think this would be a good idea? He was probably going to fall off his broom and make a fool of himself in front of her. Hopefully, she wouldn’t actually watch him.

That hope fell unfounded, however, as Murphy saw her wave to him hesitantly, and if he wasn’t so far away he might even think that she was blushing under his gaze. Matching her sheepish energy, he removed one hand from its sweaty grip on his broom to wave back at her.

Seemingly just as he did so, the whistle was blown to start the drill and Murphy nearly fell off his broom out of startlement. Recollecting himself, he faced the action of the field head-on and tried to catch a glimpse of the opposing keeper.

Roan smirked at him from the other side of the pitch and straddled his broom more firmly, most likely just trying to intimidate him. It was working.

The match progressed quickly in front of him, and, to Murphy’s surprise, he wasn’t actually that terrible at blocking quaffles. More often than not, he missed them with his hand, but he seemed to have a gift of letting them bounce off his head. 

In fact, by the middle of the match, Murphy had given up on traditional blocking methods entirely and just kept aiming his head at the incoming balls, only slightly spurred on by the fact that it seemed to be making Emori laugh in the bleachers. Not that he was staring at the bleachers every time there wasn’t a threat coming his way, of course. That would be absurd.

It wasn’t until nearly the end of the drill that Murphy looked back up at Roan, who, at that point, had just let a quaffle fly straight past him into the hoop. He had to stop himself from laughing at the sight for fear of penalty for bad sportsmanship. Was Roan a lousy keeper? Now _that_ was a twist.

Before he knew it, the whistle was blown and everyone was instructed to come back to the ground, which Murphy did a little slowly in case he fell off his broom in exhilaration. 

Not a moment after his feet touched the grass, Murphy was tackled in an enormous hug. He didn’t need to look to know who it was, he just hugged his friend back excitedly and sunk his hand into a head of curly hair. Nostalgia creeped into his bones once more, and Murphy closed his eyes and wished he could keep it this way forever.

Bellamy pulled back after a minute and jabbed his friend in the chest playfully. “You were amazing, Murph! Echo could barely land a point with you on the hoop, you were just ‘bang bang bang!’” He punctuated this by shaking his head around like a madman, seeming to be imitating Murphy’s success at blocking balls.

Murphy laughed. “You did awesome too, man! There’s no way you’re not gonna make the team!”

In truth, Murphy hadn’t actually seen much of Bellamy during the drill, half because he was flying too fast to keep tabs on, and half because Murphy had his eyes in the bleachers most of the time. Based on what he heard, though, it did sound like Bellamy did a great job.

As the excitement died down, Murphy heard Anya announce that they’d now be subbing in the rest of the candidates, and anyone who had already tried out was free to leave. The results would be posted in the common room tomorrow morning.

“Miller and Mbege are waiting in the dorm to celebrate with us, come on!” Bellamy said as soon as the announcement was over, grabbing Murphy’s hand.

Murphy gave a soft smile to his friend and removed his hand from his grasp. “Can’t, I gotta go work on my potions project. I’ll catch up with you later, alright?”

“Oh,” Bellamy said disappointedly, and Murphy could have sworn he almost looked hurt. Whatever it was, it didn’t last for long as his friend put on a stern face. “You’re really choosing the freak over us?”

“I keep telling you not to call her that, and no, I’m not, the project is due tomorrow and I need to do it, okay? Don’t get all upset about it.”

In reality, it probably did seem a little unrealistic that Murphy was blowing off his friends to do homework, considering that in partner projects he usually threw it all on the other person. So, yes, he _was_ choosing Emori over them. He needed to. He just couldn’t exactly explain why yet.

With a final pat to Bellamy’s shoulder, Murphy took off towards the bleachers to talk to Emori. This is the moment he’s been waiting for for days, he could barely contain his excitement.

As he approached his partner on the top row, she smiled delicately and clapped her hands slowly for him. 

He blushed. “Quit it, I told you not to watch, anyway.”

She flushed a little too at the acknowledgment she was watching him, but shook it off and grabbed her bag to start walking down the bleacher stairs with him. “You did good, I think. I don’t really know the rules, but it was definitely fun to watch.”

“Me getting hit in the head for an hour was fun to watch?” he teased.

“Well you were obviously _trying_ to get hit in the head, so it must have been a little fun.”

They both laughed as they headed to the courtyard and back into the castle. It was gonna be a good night, Murphy could feel it.

-

“Okay, I need… four Valerian sprigs.”

Murphy dug through Emori’s bag of ingredients for the bottle of flower sprigs, dumping four into his hand and handing it to her. Their hands touched briefly as he passed them along, and she met his eyes for a split second before continuing with the potion. 

“What do you think Snape needs all these sleeping potions for anyway? Putting everyone to sleep and taking over the school?” Murphy joked to break the tension.

Their conversation had been light since they arrived in the nearly empty study hall, but he was aching to take it further. Murphy didn’t just want to be partners with her, he wanted to be friends. And he was determined to make that happen by the end of the night.

“Definitely world domination,” Emori teased, waving her wand over the cauldron. Murphy couldn’t believe that she hadn’t known about magic before last year, with how skilled she seemed to be at it.

That must be what happens when you’re lonely, he thought sadly.

Murphy laughed at her remark, which seemed to make her smile. He liked her smile, it was warm and affectionate despite the lack of people she was able to show it to. He felt honoured every time she flashed it at him. “So, what’s next?” Murphy asked, gesturing to the potion.

The sooner the potion was completed the sooner they could talk about other things.

“Uh…” Emori began, squinting at her potions book. “Oh, we have to leave it to brew for five minutes. So, I guess nothing,” she said the last bit jokingly.

Five minutes. Perfect. That’s all the time he needed.

They sat awkwardly for a moment, the way they did when he approached her in Snape’s class the other day, but Murphy wasn’t going to let that happen again. Better to just dive in deep straight on than to wade in shallow waters for five minutes, right?

“Why do you always ignore me?” Murphy knew why, but he wanted to hear her say it so he could put an end to the insecurities she had about him. He was not like his friends, and he needed her to know that. 

Emori locked eyes with him, not looking apprehensive like he thought she would but instead fiery and prepared, like she expected it. “The same reason you never try to talk to me when your friends are around.”

Their eyes remained connected in the moments following, desperate blue mingling with ostracized brown and forming questions and answers and revelations that neither of them were prepared to speak into truth.

_What are you so desperate for?_

Nothing. Anything. Myself.

_I can’t give you that._

Maybe not, but you understand.

_And your friends don’t?_

Stop asking questions you know the answers to.

_You first._

Murphy broke his eyes off, staring at his hands resting in his lap. Maybe this was a bad idea, she clearly hates him.

“I know you’re not like them, John.”

Or not.

She spoke so softly that he might not have heard her if he wasn’t listening, but he was. He had to.

“I just can’t,” Emori continued, glancing away from him to the other side of the hall. “I can’t do false hope. Not when I’ve finally gotten somewhere in my life. I mean, two years ago I was sleeping on bus benches and _now_ I am living in a castle, John. I can’t slip up.”

Her voice was trembling, but he could see that she wasn’t crying despite her glassy eyes. Feeling a little bolder in his resolve, Murphy laid a hand on her badass one sitting on the table. Emori snapped her head back to face him, and then stared down at their hands in bewilderment.

“It’s not false hope,” Murphy promised, wrapping his fingers around her fused ones. “It’s not a prank or a scheme or anything. It’s just me, wanting you to be my friend. Not because I pity you or because I feel bad about my shitty friends and how they treat you. Just because I think you’re a really good person, and maybe I need a really good person in my life. Selfish, I know right?”

Emori’s eyes flicked between their hands and his face so many times he thought she might get dizzy, but then her chin was quivering and though she wasn’t crying, it felt like maybe she was on the inside. He squeezed her hand. She hesitated for a long moment, and squeezed back.

“Friends?” Murphy asked hopefully.

Emori laughed softly, and he saw her nod before she answered verbally. 

“Yeah, okay. Friends.”

-

Murphy awoke to a loud voice and an extra weight on his bed.

“Murphy! Get up! Murph, come on!”

He didn’t have time to register what was happening, because Bellamy was very literally dragging him out of bed. 

“What are you doing? Okay, okay, I’m coming!” Murphy groaned sleepily as he got out of bed and rushed out of the dormitory on Bellamy’s tail.

When he arrived in the common room, it was hard to miss the swarm of students crowding around a spot on the far wall. Still rubbing the sleep out of his eyes, he followed Bellamy’s lead over to the crowd, where he was met with pats on the back from several different people.

Confused, he pushed past them to see what the fuss was about.

**Slytherin Quidditch Team Results**

No way in hell.

**John Murphy - Keeper**

Murphy laughed and turned around to find Bellamy. “We made the team?”

“We made the team!” Bellamy nearly shouted, capturing him in another big hug, which was then joined by Miller and Mbege. 

Pulling away, Murphy left Bellamy to talk to Miller and turned to walk towards the girl sitting in the back corner of the common room.

Emori mimicked her slow clap and smile from tryouts as he neared. “Congrats, John.”

Murphy grinned. It was gonna be a good year.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi!! I hope you enjoyed the second chapter!! I was so excited to post this chapter because there’s a lot more story and characters than the first one.   
> I know the story has been pretty vague regarding Murphy and Emori’s backstories, but that’s because chapter 3 is going to go really in depth into them.
> 
> See you next week!


	3. Year 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Haunted by a strange dream, Emori spends her third winter at Hogwarts grappling with new feelings and old ones.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi guys!! I just want to preface this chapter by once again apologizing for it being so long, I hope that you still enjoy it, though :))
> 
> Two things worth mentioning-  
> 1\. I took some creative liberties with Otan and Emori’s backstory. Dont hate me :)  
> 2\. While the first 2 chapters were set at the very beginning of the year that they were about, this one takes place during the winter of the year.
> 
> Also, I’m not well versed in the physics of snow lmao

**Year 3**

**Emori**

_The sound of dripping water rang in her ears, accompanied only by the creaking of a wooden floor as she took a step forward._

_Drip._

_The room was nearly pitch black, and she found herself stumbling around it helplessly, searching for some kind of light. Her next step forward resulted in her knee slamming against a hard, cold rod. On the other side of the room, a fireplace sprang to life._

_Clutching her knee in a groan, she examined the now lit room carefully, beginning with the dusty bed she had collided with in the darkness. There was not only one of these small beds, she discovered, but two, both neatly tucked against the wall. As she approached the second bed to inspect it, the dripping noise grew louder. She turned slowly to her right, laying her eyes on a rusty faucet dripping water into a full sink and in turn, onto the floor._

_Drip._

_Something drew her to it. She ran her finger steadily over the edge of the corroded sink, and then, by pure instinct, allowed her fingertip to graze the top of the water filling it to the brim._

_The moment she touched the water, the faucet stopped dripping completely, but seeping into the water from her fingertip was red, red, red. It clouded up the clear depths and followed a path of destruction down to floor until her feet were stained with the colour of the cursed liquid._

_Her throat burned and she might have been screaming, but she couldn’t hear a thing. There were no more noises in the room. It was too loud._

_She backed away from the sink and rammed herself into the post of the second bed in her escape, sending a wave of pain through her whole body. Pain. It was all she felt._

_The water seemed to be coming from everywhere and nowhere at once, and soon the entire floor was glazed with red, red, red. She sloshed through it, looking for answers, for help, for a door. But she failed. No, there was nothing here for her at all._

_Turn around._

_She did. Behind her was a figure laced in shadows and adorned in all black, a hood covering its face. A sense of familiarity washed over her, as if the figure was someone she could recognize anywhere. But who?_

_She took a step backwards. Somehow, the water was up to her knees now._

_“Who are you?”_

_Silence. Too loud._

_“Where am I?”_

_More silence. Her ears were bleeding._

_“Help me.”_

_Her left forearm began to burn excruciatingly, and if she was crying she couldn’t know it- the tears were soaked up by the water now up to her waist._

_“What do you want?” She might have shrieked at her tormentor, but it wasn’t heard._

_Too loud._

_She felt the water claim the first strands of her hair, and then her collarbones, and then it was swallowing up her neck and she lifted her chin in a feeble attempt to save herself._

_Red, red, red._

_Too loud._

_The water rose above her head and she tried with all her strength to float above it, but her feet were anchored to the floor. Just as her lungs were growing weak and heavy, the figure, submerged with her, began lifting its hand to remove the hood from its head._

_“Who are you?”_

_There was water in her mouth._

_“Help me.”_

_There was water in her eyes._

_Red, red, red._

-

Emori’s eyes snapped open to a serene, white sky. Shaken from her nightmare, she desperately drank in the cold air surrounding her in an attempt to forget the feeling still pounding at her lungs. Slightly calmer after a few moments, she rested her head deeper into the scratchy surface of the grass she had awoken in.

“You alright? You fell asleep,” someone said, causing her to jump a little despite the soothingness of the voice.

She turned her head slightly, and was met with icy blue boring into her worriedly.

Oh. John.

_Who else would it be?_

A wave of chills overtook her spine as she recalled the shadowy figure from her dream. It had felt familiar to her in the moment, but now she failed to place why. The hood had nearly fallen just as she woke up, and her mind raced as she wondered who was under it.

Pushing herself up to sit on the grass, she held the gaze he had her locked under. John… 

_Who else would it be?_

“I’m fine,” Emori choked out, eyes pulling away from his nervously. “Just had a weird dream is all.”

John nodded, but looked unconvinced. She swallowed and surveyed her surroundings, slowly remembering where she was.

They were sitting in a corner of the castle’s courtyard, which was adorned with frosty grass for what felt like miles, and was surrounded by the school’s vast towers that, from this angle, seemed as if they were piercing the sky. The courtyard was mostly empty besides a few students scattered here and there, and John had suggested that they try to study here this morning. Emphasis on try, because they had been joking around and eating chocolate frogs for most of the time.

And falling asleep, apparently.

_That wasn’t safe. We can’t trust anyone here._

Not even… 

John was still sitting criss cross in front of her, looking entirely too adorable as he struggled to remove his next chocolate frog from its wrapper, his hair flopping in his face at his efforts.

_Especially not him. He’s playing you for a fool and you’re allowing it. Cut your losses and run._

He couldn’t have been the hooded figure, Emori decided. He was John. Her friend. He would never hurt her, she was sure of it.

_Since when were you this naive? Who could ever be friends with you? He’s been hurting you since the day you met him. You might as well just drown yourself…_

“Yes!” 

Emori snapped up from her thoughts when she heard John’s exclamation, and despite the darkness circling her mind, her lips almost turned up at the sound of his voice.

He looked up at her with those soft eyes that always made her stumble. “I’m not really that hungry, actually.” John said, referring to the chocolate frog he had finally unearthed from it’s wrapper. He held it out in front of her invitingly. “You have it.”

Butterflies flooded their way into her stomach as she accepted the candy, and Emori could feel her attempts to hold back her smile fail. “Thanks, John.”

_He could be wearing the hood right now and you’d still act like this, you idiot._

The belltower tolled, signaling that class would be starting soon, and Emori couldn’t have been more relieved. She bit the head off of the chocolate frog John had given her as they both stood up and began walking into the halls of the castle together. 

Despite her many doubts, being friends with John Murphy for a year and a half had been the most fun she’d had in her life. She never truly opened up to him the way she did in their first encounters, keeping their friendship surface level for security. In turn, he kept her away from his friends, which meant they had only ever hung out alone. 

Not that she was complaining- it was much better that way. Emori knew that he tried to make his friends be nice to her, but none of them seemed capable of it. This was especially because of Josephine, who John claimed he also hated, but she wasn’t sure she believed that. From the moment Emori stepped foot in Hogwarts one thing was very apparent to her: _everyone_ liked Josephine. Unfortunately, Josephine hated her. That’s where the “everyone” part sucked for Emori.

Regardless of these things, however, she had to admit John was a great friend, even though her references were lacking in that category. He seemed to revel in spending time with her (maybe a little too much, she thought with a blush), and he loved helping her figure out all the magic things she didn’t understand and walking her to her classes, even when his was on the other side of the school. Like right now.

“Are you going to Hogsmeade this weekend?” John asked, breaking their comfortable silence.

“What’s that?” Emori actually did know what Hogsmeade was, she had eavesdropped on Josephine and Clarke talking about it in the girls’ dormitory the previous night, but she never got tired of seeing John’s eyes light up when he got to explain something.

“It’s a little village right down the road from here. This is our first year that we get to go, I’m so excited! I heard that there’s an entire shop just filled with candy, and there’s a joke shop, too. I’m gonna buy a bunch of stuff and mess with Bellamy.”

Emori’s stomach twinged at the mention of the other boy. It’s not like she hadn’t tried to get along with John’s other friends at the beginning of their friendship, but for whatever reason, Bellamy Blake hated her. 

_You should just be lucky he hasn’t convinced John to hate you yet._

He probably has tried to, Emori reasoned, if the dirty looks he always gave her before he snatched up John’s arm and dragged him away from her were anything to go by. 

She grimaced at the thought as another realization followed it into her mind. “Aren’t you going with Bellamy and your friends? I’ll have no one to hang out with.”

John rolled his eyes. “You can hang out _with_ us. Isn’t it about time we all get along?”

“I’ve tried to get along with them, they just hate me anyway.” He opened his mouth as if to protest, and she quickly changed the subject. “Besides, don’t you need a permission slip to go? It’s not like I have anyone to sign one for me.”

Emori kept her eyes on him warily, watching the gears turn under his messy hair. His determination to solve problems was cute, she thought, if not pointless. You needed a parent or guardian to sign permission slips, another category where Emori was lacking. 

Then, as if just to rub it in her face, his face brightened with what she supposed was an idea.

“Are you still in that foster home?” John questioned, seeming slightly distracted by his own thoughts. 

She was. At the end of her first year, the school administration seemed to decide it was unethical to throw a student back onto the non-magic streets just to invite her back in a few months. Their solution to this was throwing her into the wizarding foster care system instead, more for shelter than actual hopes of her getting adopted, since she was already older than the target age. The group home didn’t have the best conditions, and the woman running it looked like the kind of witch that ate children, but it was constant food and shelter, which was good enough for Emori.

“Yeah, why?”

Emori thought that maybe after over a year, his sweet smiles towards her would make her heart flutter less. She was wrong, it appeared. 

“Then don’t worry about it. I’m getting you that permission slip, Mori.”

A red flush creeped its way onto her cheeks at the nickname, even though it wasn’t a new one. What was wrong with her today? 

_You’re letting yourself be manipulated, for starters._

John’s smile didn’t fade as he gave a pat to her shoulder and began heading in the opposite direction to his class. She hadn’t even noticed they had reached hers.

“How?” Emori called out to him. He was walking away from her backwards so that he could still face her, stumbling into some students in his path- a sight that she found endlessly adorable. 

When he reached the corner, he stopped in front of it to yell back to her, “I have my ways!” With that, John disappeared around the corner. Emori laughed at his silliness, but vaguely wondered what he was planning to do. 

Even if he did manage to get her a permission slip, she thought, going to Hogsmeade felt like a disaster waiting to happen. 

_Finally, we’re on the same page._

Shaking the thoughts from her head, she entered her class wearily, taking an isolated seat at the front of the room. There were still five days until Saturday, that was plenty of time for her to figure things out.

-

There were three days until Saturday, and figuring things out wasn’t as easy as she expected.

Emori was lying on a soft couch in the Slytherin common room, one she usually frequented to study, desperately trying not to fall asleep. The issue wasn’t that she hadn’t slept at all since her nightmare in the courtyard, it was that she had.

Everytime she drifted to sleep, she was back in that suffocating room. The hooded figure was always there when she turned around, and she always woke up before it revealed its face.

_John’s face, you mean._

It’s not John, Emori reassured herself, her jaw clenched in frustration.

_Who else would it be?_

She had plenty of tormentors in her life. One of them was following her to her dreams, that’s all. 

_It feels too close to you to be one of them. What you’re feeling is betrayal, not persecution…_

John wouldn’t betray her, Emori thought decisively once again, biting her lip.

_Why wouldn’t he? Don’t be naive._

He wouldn’t, John is-

Standing in front of her, shoving a piece of parchment in front of her face. 

“Did someone say they needed a permission slip for Hogsmeade?” he said proudly.

Snatching it from his hands in disbelief, Emori examined what he had brought for her. It was, in fact, a completed permission slip, filled out by the woman from her foster home.

“How did you get this?” Emori asked incredulously. 

John pushed her feet off the couch so he could sit next to her, a satisfied grin taking over his face. “I told you, I have my ways.” He punctuated this with a wink, to which she rolled her eyes.

“No, seriously, what did you do?”

“Don’t worry about it,” he replied, rummaging through his bag for something, before extracting a jelly doughnut in a baggy he must have snagged from breakfast that morning. “Split it?”

Emori was starving, but held her tongue for now. She wasn’t going to let him get away with this so easily. “John,” she deadpanned.

John sighed in defeat. “Jaha has connections with the lady that runs that home, it’s where he adopted me from or whatever. I just wrote to him asking if he could get you a permission slip, that’s all.”

The sheepishness of his confession made her smile, but there was still something bothering her. “I thought you hated writing to your adoptive dad.”

He met her gaze then, holding her brown eyes hostage to his blue ones. “I do, but getting to spend a day in Hogsmeade with you is worth it.”

A rush of crimson rose to her cheeks at his remark, and she turned her head away so he couldn’t see the effect it had on her. It must not have worked, though, because he smirked and tore his doughnut in half, placing her piece in her lap, surely leaving a mark on her robes in powdered sugar.

Taking a bite of the doughnut, Emori stole a glance at him at her side, and then at the permission slip balanced on her knee. John had really gone out of his way to get that for her, just so they could experience Hogsmeade together. Something about the whole thing made her heart pang in her chest, and she surrendered to the feeling. 

That’s settled, then, Emori thought hazily, a different, unfamiliar feeling creeping its way into her. She was going to Hogsmeade with John. What could go wrong?

-

“What could go wrong?” Emori heard a voice cut through the darkness of the common room, and she sunk back further into her chair as to not draw attention to herself.

The girls’ dormitory had been alive with chatter that night, so she had escaped to the empty common room for some peace and quiet. She hadn’t bothered to light any candles or the fireplace, content to cuddle up in one of the chairs and get some sleep, hoping that the serene environment wouldn’t foster nightmares.

Unfortunately, this plan was thwarted by the door to the boys’ dormitory opening, releasing what sounded like two of the boys looking to break curfew. She rolled her eyes at the recklessness being displayed, but listened to their conversation nonetheless.

“A lot, actually- come on, man, we should go back to bed.” replied the other boy warily, and she heard their walking come to a stop.

This was a voice that Emori recognized immediately: John. Which meant the other voice had to have been-

“Since when were you such a chicken, Murph? Come on, we’re just going up to the kitchen, it’ll be fun.” Bellamy said. 

Emori bit her lip to stop herself from calling out to defend him, instead opting to sink even further into the chair.

John scoffed, and she heard him punch his friend lightly. “Quit it, I’m not a chicken. It’s just that if they catch us out after curfew, which they definitely will, they’re not gonna let us go to Hogsmeade this weekend.”

She could hear the softness in his voice then, and Emori’s blood boiled at Bellamy for risking them getting in trouble when he must know how excited John was to go to Hogsmeade. 

“We might as well not go,” Bellamy returned irritably. “You already ruined it by inviting the freak, it’s not even gonna be fun anymore.”

The language wasn’t by any means new to Emori, but it did sting to hear the words be said in front of John. 

_You know he’s not going to defend you, right?_

She clenched her jaw and stared out into the darkness. Of course he would defend her, she assured herself. He always did.

_In front of you, maybe. Are you ready to see how he acts when you’re not around? I can already picture the hood on his head…_

“Shut up, don’t call her that,” John grumbled, and Emori almost let out an audible sigh of relief. She knew it.

He took a moment to continue, seeming to calculate his response carefully. “Listen, Bell, she doesn’t have any friends. You don’t have to like her, but at least tolerate her enough to let her come with us. She deserves it.”

Emori’s heart stopped. What did he just say?

“So that’s the real reason you’ve been friends with her for a year? ‘Cause you feel bad for her?”

She was completely frozen in her seat, not letting even a single breath escape her. John paused for a moment before replying, but those mere seconds felt like hours of torture.

“I mean, yeah. Why else would I?”

Emori was suffocating, she was sure of it. However terrible the misery she had felt being drowned and choked out of her last breath in her nightmares, this had to have been a thousand times worse. 

Hands clawing at the cushion beneath her, she curled herself into it and squeezed her eyes shut, praying for any type of escape from the hell she was trapped in. Just one simple sentence from his traitorous lips and she was underwater, gasping for air only to be smothered by the waves of her own hurt.

_Told you._

Bellamy and her tormentor were still talking, she observed vaguely, but she couldn’t hear a word they were saying. It was too loud. It was all too loud.

A door opened somewhere, a knob turning and a lock clicking out of place, and she identified it to be the one leading to the boys’ dormitory. Emori spared it a glance, watching the silhouette of the two boys enter the dark hallway, though she noticed that one hung back a bit, as if to survey the empty common room.

Not empty, she thought bitterly. She was here, and she had heard everything. She caught him and his lies and his soft eyes and sweet smiles and pitiful generosity red-handed.

Wiping the saltiness from her lips and the dampness from her cheeks with her robe sleeve, any ounce of sadness Emori felt left her body, leaving behind something hot and blistering. She was not a charity case for his nice guy agenda, nor was she a game for him to play until he got bored. She would show him who he thought he was toying with so innocently.

The hood has fallen, John Murphy. And all Emori could see was red, red, red.

-

John squeezed her wrist lightly as they turned in their permission slips and boarded the train to Hogsmeade. Before, the gesture would have felt sweet and reassuring, maybe it even would have made her blush, but now it only felt condescending. Emori scowled at the back of his head as he led them to their compartment.

His friends were already there, filling up the compartment seats obnoxiously as Emori and John sat together furthest away from the window. When they were seated, she yanked her hand roughly from his grasp and turned to face the train hallway, only catching a quick glimpse of his “hurt” expression before glueing her eyes to the compartment opposite to them.

The last few days since that night in the common room had been hell, but she knew it would be worth it when they got to Hogsmeade and she could get her revenge. Emori had been avoiding him as much as possible, which proved to be quite difficult considering how much time they spent together recently. So when they did have to hang out together, she acted cold and distant towards him. 

Generally speaking, his reactions to her behavior had been mostly confused, but she didn’t miss the traces of sadness that glazed over his eyes as well. Why was he even pretending to be sad at her drawing back? Because his latest charity case wasn’t as grateful as she should’ve been?

“You guys know Emori,” John introduced her awkwardly, and she had no choice but to turn her head and face his friends head on.

She knew Bellamy, of course, who had taken the window seat on the opposite side of the compartment, and she recognized Nathan Miller and John Mbege from the common room and some of her classes. They all looked at her uncomfortably, but none as uncomfortable as Bellamy, who was shooting daggers at her through his harsh gaze.

That wouldn’t matter after today, Emori thought. Soon, the charade would be up and Bellamy could have John all to himself again, like he clearly wanted. Briefly, she wondered if John ever noticed the pining looks his friend was always directing towards him, but let the thought(and the strange twinge in her heart that it caused) leave her mind. She had more important things to worry about.

The train ride progressed, John’s friends talking amongst themselves with him throwing in quips here and there, but he was mostly silent, she noticed. Feeling a nudge against her arm, Emori turned to face him once again, annoyed by his persistence to interact with her. His deep blue eyes were hopeful and sweet, and it almost cracked through her hostile demeanor. Breaking her gaze at his face before it could break her, she observed what he was holding out for her in his hand.

A chocolate frog.

_Look at him, trying to manipulate you. You’re lucky you know better now._

Emori looked back at the train hallway, effectively declining his offer. Every part of her ached to check if he was saddened by it, but she held her ground and kept her eyes focused anywhere else.

As they stepped off the train and entered Hogsmeade, Emori, even in her grouchy state, couldn’t deny that it was the most beautiful place she had ever seen. The village was at a higher elevation than Hogwarts, which meant it wasn’t just frosting, but full on snowing. She had never witnessed a place with as much joy teeming from every edge, the whole town alive with residents and glazed in sparkling white. Emori must have been smiling at the view, because she caught John glancing at her happily. She winced.

Not a minute after departing the train, Bellamy was dragging John off into the village, and though he spared an apologetic look in her direction, he followed his friend eagerly.

Emori wandered the town quite eagerly herself, not minding the lack of company as much as she thought she would. If John had been manipulating her all this time, she was glad she was at least able to manipulate a permission slip for this place out of him. 

After over an hour of snaking in and out of shops crowded with students, Emori finally found refuge upon entering an empty pub that she thought from the sign also served as an inn. She was lucky she did, because the snow outside was escalating quickly, and it had been up to her thighs by the time she got inside.

The place was deserted, she observed, the wooden floor unravaged by melted snow from outside and the plethora of tables and chairs untouched. The only other person in the room was the old man sitting behind the bar, which she approached cautiously and took a seat.

“Hello dear,” the man said, his long beard swaying over his torso as he rotated to face her. “What brings you ‘ere? Shouldn’t you be running ‘round causing trouble with your friends?” He ended with a laugh at his own joke, and she offered him an empty chuckle in return.

“Don’t really have any of those,” Emori said, tracing a crack on the wooden bar counter with the fingers of her right hand, careful to have kept her left hand tucked in her lap.

The old man chuckled amongst himself, she supposed at some inside joke she couldn’t possibly know. “Who needs ‘em, anyways?” he laughed. “How ‘bout a butterbeer for you, dear?”

Emori smiled politely, but raised her hand in rejection. “Sorry, I don’t have any money.”

“I’ve got it,” a voice said from behind her, and she hadn’t heard the door open, but it must have because John was walking towards her smugly. He placed a few galleons on the counter and took the seat next to her. “Make it two, please.”

Taking the coins with a nod, the old man got to work behind the counter preparing two glasses with a foamy, golden brown liquid.

This wasn’t her plan. Well, technically, she hadn’t really _had_ a plan, but she had a goal: Emori was going to get revenge, make him suffer the way she suffered, win this stupid game he was playing. 

But now that they were alone, and he was right where she wanted him… she couldn’t do it. The anger in her that had built up over the past few days of vacant stares and ice spewing out of her to deflect his warmth was melting into sadness, and she didn’t know if she was going to burst into tears or explode. Only one way to find out, she supposed.

“Stop it, John.” Emori said quietly, knowing that in the silence of the pub he would hear her clearly.

“Stop what?”

Emori’s eyes snapped up from the spot on the counter she had been focusing on since he walked up. “All of it, just stop it.”

He looked genuinely confused, and Emori might’ve commended his acting skills if he wasn’t such a dick. “I have no idea what you’re talking about, but I’m not the one who’s been avoiding the other all week. That’s been you.”

“Yeah, because I’m tired of your stupid little game!”

Just as John was about to respond, the old man slammed two full glasses of butterbeer in front of them, before seeming to notice something outside and scurrying to the front door. “Oh dear, oh dear! The snow is picking up! I’d better go pick up my owl from the post shop! You kids stay put, eh?” With that, he left the pub in a hurry. 

“What are you talking about?” John continued, eyebrows furrowed in frustration. Hers were sure to be matching, at this point.

“I’m talking about you pretending to be my friend for the past year!”

John looked visibly stunned at this accusation, but bit back just as hard. “What?! I haven’t pretended to be anything! I am your friend!”

Emori slammed her arm on the counter angrily, causing butterbeer to escape from the lips of both glasses. “STOP LYING TO ME!” She yelled, feeling the first tear fall to her chin from her glassy eyes. As the room fell silent, she noticed that tears had formed in his eyes, as well.

The silence between them now was the loudest it’s ever been. Usually, they were able to fall into comfortable silence, where they each knew what the other was thinking so there was no point in speaking. What was occurring now felt nothing like that, it felt harsh and terrifying and suffocating. Emori sighed, realizing that she had to be the one to break it.

“I was in the common room Tuesday night.” she whispered to the lonely crack in the bar counter. “I heard what you said to Bellamy. That you’re only friends with me because you feel sorry for me.”

Emori didn’t look up at him, but John’s voice was so laced with shame and regret that she didn’t have to. “Fuck, Emori, I-” he paused, and she waited for him to continue, but he didn’t finish that thought. Instead, he repeated “Fuck!”, but this time in a panicked tone.

Confused, she lifted her gaze to him, and then followed his gaze to the door. Emori immediately realized the problem. “Oh, fuck.” she parroted as they both stood up and rushed to the door.

The top window of the wooden door was completely whited out by snow, a situation that was mirrored by the two windows on either side of it.

John reached for the doorknob, an idea that Emori classified as horrible, and slowly inched the door open. She didn’t miss the way he held his arm out in front of her in case they were about to get crushed by snow.

The good news was that they were, in fact, not crushed by snow upon opening the door. The bad news was that there was a door shaped imprint in the block of snow keeping them in. 

“Do you know a spell for this?” Emori asked hopefully.

John closed the door and leaned against it, blue eyes wide with his nervousness. “Nope, do you?”

“Why would I ask you if I did?” she deadpanned. 

He moved away from the door to stand next to her, crossing his arms as he studied it. “We could try to melt it?”

“Doing a fire spell while trapped in a wooden room with no exits? Aren’t you full of good ideas.” Emori grumbled, seating herself on top of one of the abandoned tables close to the door.

Silence fell over them again. Emori laid back on the dusty table in boredom as John sat in front of the door, clearly thinking of ideas to get through it. By their lack of doing so, she could assume this feat wasn’t going well. 

Staring at the ceiling in agitation, Emori recounted the events that led her to this situation. John caught her stealing, John wanted to be her friend, John was playing her the whole time- and now, she and John were trapped alone in a room together. Of all the less than ideal things that have happened to her in her life, this was shaping up to be a top contender.

“I didn’t mean it, Mori,” John finally spoke quietly. She sat up on the table and stared at the back of his head, his eyes still glued on the door despite his confession.

The nickname used to make her heart flutter, but now it felt like he was mocking her. Emori gritted her teeth and clutched the end of the table. “Don’t call me that. I heard you say it.”

“I know I said it,” he tried again, as if she was the unreasonable one here. “But I didn’t mean it, Emori. I really didn’t. I could never… I just- I didn’t want Bellamy to know the truth, okay?” 

John turned around to face her, and the icy blue of his eyes were glazed over with tears. She looked into them, and inside was that same genuinity she had spotted in their very first encounter two years ago, when he told her that her hand was badass.

_He was lying then, too. Get a grip, don’t let him suck you back in._

“What’s the truth?” Emori asked quietly, her eyes still locked with his so hopefully. She felt like a fool, searching for answers in a boy filled with questions. 

_He’s playing you for one, that’s for sure._

“That the reason I’m friends with you is because you make me feel something, Mor- Emori. For so long, I’ve been trying to feel… _anything_. And- and Bellamy tried so hard to help me fill that void, but nothing he ever said or did worked. Nothing ever worked until I met you.” John reached down and took her left hand in both of his. She hadn’t even noticed he had gotten this close, but didn’t protest his touch.

“And- I thought that it would stop there,” he continued, drowning her in his eye contact and the feel of his hands on hers. “I thought that you were the missing puzzle piece in my life, or something, but you are so much more, Emori. I- I don’t really know exactly how I feel when I’m around you, but I know it’s amazing and I never wanna let go of it. How could I tell Bellamy that I’m your friend because you’ve made my life so incredible again when he tried so hard to do that and failed?”

A pause. Her aching heart was pounding. 

“How could I explain to anyone how much I care about you, Mori? How my day gets better when you walk in a room, or how much I love the moments when the bell rings and I get to walk you to class, or how adorable you look getting powdered sugar all over you from my doughnut.”

Emori’s face burned bright red, and a feeling overtook her as if she was floating, with only his steady hands on hers keeping her grounded. She must have been crying, because John awkwardly raised his hand to her face to wipe away the stray tears, and both of them laughed at the strangeness of it all. 

Two lonely souls giving and taking, betraying and healing, she thought. Maybe John was the hooded figure from her nightmare, or maybe he was the water itself, flooding over her and overwhelming her, and it was painful and remarkable and heavy, but it was real. 

Hopping down from the table, she looked at him for a moment, and a hopeful glint twinkled in his eye. Emori smiled and wrapped her arms around his waist, curling her head into his shoulder. John hugged her back tightly, arms circling her back in a way that made her know everything he had told her was the truth. 

She could barely remember the last time she’d been hugged, so maybe that’s why she held onto him for so long, but perhaps it was something else as well. Emori just couldn’t put her finger on it at the moment.

Eventually they did have to break from their embrace, because the issue at hand was still very much prevalent. They were probably going to die snowed into a pub together, Emori thought.

“If we’re snowed in, then everyone else in town is, too.” John rationalized, walking back to the bar and picking up the two glasses of butterbeer they hadn’t touched. “Might as well make the most of it before someone rescues us.”

Emori laughed at his nonchalance, but reasoned that he was probably right. Taking a glass from his hand she held it up with a smile, knowing how goofy she probably looked but, hey, this was John she was with. 

“Cheers, to Hogsmeade!” she said.

The grin that John directed at her could melt the snow, she thought. “To Hogsmeade! And an unruined friendship!” The small sound of their glasses clinking against each other was enough to warm her heart.

Emori took a sip of her drink with a laugh, spilling a little on her robes because it was tradition at this point, and beamed at the sweetness of it all.

They sat on the counter together for nearly an hour, telling jokes and perusing through the old man’s things behind the bar, making up stories for each strange object. 

That is, until John removed a doll from the old man’s drawer, and the colour drained from Emori’s face. She took it from him slowly and turned it over in her hands.

“You alright?” John said worriedly, clearly confused by her mood change.

It was a rag doll, with hair of black yarn and adorning a blue dress. Emori recognized it immediately, but surely it couldn’t have been the same one, right?

“I’m fine,” she said absentmindedly. “It’s just- my brother found me a doll just like this once. I- I lost it in the non-magic world so it’s obviously not the same one, I know. It’s just- a lot.”

Emori placed the doll on the counter before she could allow tears into her eyes. John touched her hand on the doll comfortingly. “I didn’t know you had a brother.”

Nodding, she tried to blink away the glassiness of her eyes, feeling her chin quiver in the attempt.

_You’ve already cried in front of him once, how weak do you want him to think you are?_

“I did. His- his name was Otan. When my parents threw me out as a baby, he was seven. He ran away that night and went looking for me, and he raised me on the streets. He threw out his life to save me. I never understood why he would do that.”

John squeezed her hand, seemingly trying to decide if he should keep prying. “What happened to him?”

Emori swallowed. “When I was old enough to actually listen when he told me to stay somewhere, he used to disappear for hours and come back with food, or blankets, or one time, a doll,” she gestured to the one on the counter sadly. “I never knew where he went or how he did it, I thought he might’ve been in a gang at some point, but he always managed to keep us alive somehow. Then, one day, when I was eight, he left like he usually did, and I waited and waited for him to come back… but he never did.

“I never knew what happened to him. My main guess was that he got arrested for stealing, but then I started thinking of all the other things… Maybe he got kidnapped, or hit by a car, or maybe he really was in a gang and they killed him. Doesn’t matter. He’s gone, and it’s my fault. I wasted his life.”

John lifted his hand to her shoulder and squeezed it consolingly, trying to meet her eyes but hers were trained in her lap. “It wasn’t your fault, Mori.”

Emori shook her head, but he didn’t probe her anymore, just rubbed her arm comfortingly as they sat in silence. There was a tense air surrounding them, and she knew it was her fault for creating it, but she didn’t know how to continue after her confession. 

“When I was seven, I got really sick,” John said, and she snapped her head up to face him. He was wearing a sad smile. “My dad went to the shop to get me medicine for it, but I guess two guys there in a super heated fight, and they were casting spells at each other like crazy. My dad tried to stop them, but the situation escalated too quickly and one of them casted the killing curse at the other, but-” 

Tears were welling up in John’s eyes as he paused, and Emori took his hand in hers and squeezed it like he always did for her. She hoped it had the same effect.

“-but it hit my dad instead. They called him a hero, and he was, but he shouldn’t have been there at all. I got better on my own a few days later- it was my fault that he was there to be a ‘hero’. He shouldn’t have been.

“That’s what my mom always told me, too, as if I didn’t already know it. She started drinking a lot after his death, and loved to take out all her anger and shit on me. The last words she said to me before I found her in a pool of her own vomit was that I killed my father.” 

His face was wet with tears, and Emori instinctively wrapped her arms around him and pulled his head into her shoulder, letting him cry into her hair. “It wasn’t your fault, John.”

He laughed sadly, removing himself from her embrace and wiping the tears off his cheeks with his hands. “Quite a pair we make, huh?” John joked bitterly, and she chuckled with him.

They fell into a comfortable silence once again, drawing pictures in the dust on the bar counter. Every once in a while, their hands would briefly touch, and they would meet each other’s gaze for a moment, small smiles on their faces.

Emori’s heart danced in her chest at their friendship, the strange, unfamiliar feeling from a few days ago creeping back into her. She didn’t know what the feeling was or how to make it go away, but it didn’t matter. Whatever was happening, she knew that she ane John could face it together.

And maybe, Emori thought with a blush, he was experiencing this feeling about her, too.

-

John squeezed her hand as they boarded the train back to school later that night, after some Hogwarts professors had come to the rescue in Hogsmeade and cleared the snow. He hugged Bellamy when he saw him in their compartment, and his friend began to tell him about how lucky he was that he got snowed into the candy shop. John laughed and sat next to Emori in their spot from last time.

Bellamy seemed frustrated upon seeing her there, as if he had hoped she had gotten crushed by snow and left in Hogsmeade, but this time she combated his dirty looks with a sweet smile, just to egg him on. 

Emori felt a nudge on her arm, and she looked at John, who was grinning at her. Once again, he was holding out a chocolate frog for her. This time she accepted it, but broke it in half once it was in her grasp.

“Split it?” she said, and his eyes lit up as he eagerly popped his piece into his mouth. Emori laughed quietly and did the same.

Afterwards, Emori rested her head on John’s shoulder, letting the noises of the train and the laughter of his friends fill her ears as she drifted peacefully to sleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi again!! I hope that you enjoyed the third chapter!! This one was one of my favourites so I hope you guys liked it, and next one is gonna be a lot of fun too (Jade is definitely gonna like it hehe)
> 
> See you next week!


	4. Year 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The announcement of a Yule Ball created opportunity and tension for Murphy in his fourth year at Hogwarts.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys!! First I just wanted to apologize for there being no chapter last week, if you follow me on twitter you know I was going through some personal stuff for a little while, but I’m doing better now and excited to post this chapter :,)
> 
> This chapter has become one of my favourites, so I really hope you all enjoy it!!

**Year 4**

**Murphy**

The Great Hall was alive with chatter as Murphy flooded in with the rest of the school. Dizzy from the commotion, he took a seat at the Slytherin table next to Bellamy, who appeared irritated to be awake at 8 AM on a Saturday. To be fair, Murphy was too.

“What do you think the assembly’s about?” he wondered aloud. 

Bellamy’s head was on the table. “Something stupid, probably,” he grumbled, pillowing the side of his head with his arm. “Dumble-bore probably just wants to tell us they put new flowers in the courtyard.”

Laughing, Murphy ruffled the curly hair on the back of his friend’s head, and craned his own neck to scan the remainder of the hall. There was still an empty seat to the other side of him, and he knew exactly who he wanted to fill it.

Things between him and Emori had been good since that day they spent snowed in at Hogsmeade. Really good. Great, even. There was something different about their dynamic, Murphy thought. Something more trusting, but also something else. 

Okay, he’ll admit, maybe he had started being a little flirty towards her. Not in a creepy way, obviously. Just in a “we’re good friends but now we’re getting closer and _maybe_ I have a crush on you or something but I would never do anything to jeopardize our awesome friendship” kind of way. And maybe he was delusional, but he thought she might have been doing it back.

Emori had always been a hard person to read, but it seemed like the more open she became with him, the harder she was to analyze. No matter how liberated she had grown to be, there was always something behind her eyes when she looked at him that he couldn’t quite place. He had hope for what it was, but never dared to push it.

Now, he caught a glimpse of her dark hair in the next wave of students pouring into the Hall, and smiled when their eyes met. That was kind of their thing, he thought, where he could just stare into her endless brown eyes for minutes while she stared back, and there was an unspoken understanding between them. He loved that they were always so connected with each other. Murphy gestured for her to come sit with him.

As Emori mowed through the crowd of students to get to her seat, he turned around to check on Bellamy, who was now drooling onto the table.

Murphy gave a light punch to his arm. “Wake up, dumbass. If I have to be awake right now, so do you.”

“I am awake.” Bellamy groaned and opened his eyes, but didn’t lift his head.

“Hi, John,” said a third voice, and Murphy grinned widely as he whipped his head around to look at-

Josephine Lightbourne. 

In Emori’s seat. 

Because why wouldn’t she be?

“Go away, Josephine. I was saving that seat for someone.” Murphy rolled his eyes, once again scanning the crowd for his _real_ friend. “And don’t call me John.”

Emori was just now approaching the Slytherin table, stopping in her tracks when she spotted Josephine. Murphy shot her an exasperated look and stuck out his tongue, to which he caught her sparing a silent chuckle at. He wished he could hear her laugh right now.

The blonde demon sitting in his friend’s seat followed Murphy’s gaze to Emori, sending her a saccharine smile that he wanted to punch off her face. “Sorry! No savesies. There’s plenty of open seats by the first years, though. You’ll fit right in.”

You should go sit in one, then, Murphy almost quipped. Instead, he watched as Emori shrugged at him sadly and went exactly where Josephine told her to, to go sit at the front of the table with the first years. Just as he was getting up to follow her there, Professor Dumbledore entered the Hall in a dramatic sweep of his cape, shortly trailed after by a cluster of other teachers. 

The movement of the Hall came to a halt at the Headmaster’s arrival, to which Murphy pouted and sunk back into his seat. Josephine smiled at him sweetly as the assembly began.

“Welcome, students,” the Headmaster croaked out to the four filled tables, only audible due to the respectful silence overtaking the large room. “I hope that you are not too upset at being woken up so early. We have important matters to discuss today.”

“ _Sleep_ is important, too.” Bellamy’s voice was muffled by his arm that he was resting on. Murphy reached over to give his friend’s hand a good-natured squeeze, and he thought for a second the curly haired boy flinched at his touch.

“In these next few weeks, we will be hosting exchange students from Beauxbatons Academy of Magic. Many of them wish to join our family at Hogwarts permanently beginning next semester, so I expect that you will all be on your best behavior and uphold the reputation of our school with great honour.”

With that, the Hall burst into a round of whispers at the strange announcement. Even Murphy, in his grumpy state, was a little surprised. He had never heard of such a thing happening at Hogwarts.

“In addition,” Dumbledore continued as loudly as he could manage, which seemed to be barely more than a regular speaking voice. Still, silence fell over each table at his words. “To make these students feel welcome, we will be holding a Yule Ball here at Hogwarts, an age old tradition that represents unity, love, and friendship between schools.”

By the time the headmaster had ended this declaration, it seemed as if there wasn’t a single person in the Hall not buzzing about it. Even Bellamy, who Murphy thought was fully asleep by now, perked up at the news.

“Silence, please!” Professor McGonagall cried out rather effectively.

Professor Dumbledore stroked his long beard as he prepared to speak again, an action that Murphy recalled as one he and Emori had mocked on several occasions. His eyes wandered to the front of the long table for his partner in crime, who he found was already looking his way with a smirk. He threw her one back accompanied by a wink, and was rewarded with the sight of her biting her lip in laughter. That adorable mannerism always sent a rush of warmth into his chest.

“Only those in their fourth year or higher may attend the Ball,”-a round of groans rang out from the younger students- “ _unless_ those in a lower class are asked and accompanied by a student in a higher one. For those who are eligible to attend, it is encouraged to have a dancing partner. Appropriate dress is not encouraged, but required. The Ball will take place two weeks from today, right here in the Great Hall. I do hope that it is a unifying event for each of our schools, and that you all plan to take it seriously as such. Now, enjoy your breakfast.”

With those final words and a mere wave of a wrinkled hand’s wand, each table sprung to life with the food and pastries that they usually adorned at breakfast time, and the Hall filled itself with conversation once more. Murphy was already stuffing a jelly doughnut into his mouth when his own group began discussing the announcement.

“Wow, a ball!” Josephine crooned, resting a hand on Murphy’s shoulder. “How romantic…”

Shoving her hand off his shoulder, Murphy rolled his eyes, reaching for another doughnut to put in his bag for later. He smiled absentmindedly as he recalled yet another of his and Emori’s “things”- sharing food. The thought reminded him of the weight of her head on his shoulder on the train back from Hogsmeade last year, the feeling of hope and bliss that had washed over him when she broke that chocolate frog in half. Murphy spared a quick glance at her at the front of the table, but she was occupied with a book she was reading.

Only then did Josephine’s words really sink in, that a ball was quite romantic, and that maybe such an event could bring together two friends who were so close but so far apart. Even with their distance, Murphy studied the features of Emori’s face closely. Her focused, furrowed brows. Her secretive, but as he now knew them, soft eyes. The way her lips quirked up slightly as she read. He thought maybe he wanted to kiss the proud dimple that appeared on her cheek when she did that, but wondered if that was too invasive a thought to entertain.

“-Besides, we all know who _Murphy_ is gonna ask,” said Miller with a smirk, snapping him out of his daydream. He hadn’t realized they had continued talking, but it was now clear to him that they all noticed him staring at Emori. 

Murphy wasn’t the only one who’s attention was grabbed by this remark, though. Bellamy’s head released itself from its residence on the table to snap up and stare at his friend. There was something in the boy’s eyes then that Murphy couldn’t quite read.

“John is just in a rebellious phase, which I think is _adorable_ ,” said Josephine in the most annoyingly flirtatious voice Murphy had ever heard. “He’ll come around eventually… Hopefully by two weeks.” She winked at him, a gesture that caused him to throw up in his mouth a little.

Murphy was just about to protest when another voice piped up to speak on his behalf.

“Josie’s right, he isn’t gonna ask that fr- Emori to the Ball.” Bellamy said sharply, his hand coming up to rest on his Murphy’s arm. He thought that Bellamy looked almost hopeful at his own assertion. “Right, Murph?”

Sighing, Murphy snuck another glance at Emori. An air of caution always floated around her, as if she could snap back to being distrustful of him at any moment, as if it was second nature to her. Asking her to the Ball as a date would be a terrible idea, he decided. The friendship that he had spent four years building could all come crashing down in one night.

But… There was something about the way her hair fell delicately in her face as she leaned over her book, the way her cheek squished into the weight of the badass hand she propped herself up on, the way her wonder glazed eyes could comfort him and break him all at the same time. It made him want to throw both their cautions to the wind.

“Dunno,” replied Murphy absentmindedly, entranced by the way the graceful fingers of her right hand turned each page. “I might.”

When he finally broke his gaze from Emori, he noticed Bellamy’s face looked paler than before. “This whole Ball thing is a stupid waste of time,” grumbled his friend, slinging his bag over his shoulder. “See you guys later.”

With that, Bellamy exited the Great Hall in the direction of the Slytherin common room. He was definitely acting strange, Murphy decided. It was never any secret that Bellamy didn’t like Emori (despite his many attempts to make them friends), but recently it seemed like any mention of the girl put his friend on edge. Murphy made a mental note to ask him about it later.

For now, he collected his own bag from the floor and made his way to the front of the table to sit with Emori, who laughed at him for bringing a doughnut from his side of the table when there was a plate of them sitting right in front of her. He flushed a bit, but ultimately smiled at her laugh. It was one of the best sounds he had ever heard, and it made him sad sometimes that he was the only person who got to hear it.

Murphy shifted the conversation to the book she had been reading, smiling once again at the way her eyes lit up at the opportunity to talk about it. That was another endearing thing about her- the way her face brightens at indications of interest, at signs that he cares about her. He supposed she had never gotten those before, and all he wanted to do was give them to her.

Then, he wondered if being asked to a ball would count as an indication of interest, and his mind shifted to daydreams of taking her hand and dragging her into a slow dance, of twirling her around and hearing her beautiful laugh, of getting lost in her angelic eyes.

“John?”

Realizing he had spaced out, he masked his clear daydreaming with a laugh and urged her to continue what she was talking about. She looked at him skeptically, as if she was trying to analyze him herself, but kept telling him about the story she was reading about three brothers. 

Murphy wasn’t _that_ screwed, he reasoned as he listened to her talk. All he had to do was play it cool, not think about the ball, and let the moment to ask her come naturally. He could do this.

-

Not thinking about the ball, he soon realized, was easier said than done.

It had been three days since the assembly, and there was not a single student in Hogwarts not buzzing about the Yule Ball every few seconds. Just walking through the hallways on his way back to the Slytherin common room, Murphy overheard no less than five conversations regarding dates, dresses, dancing, and all the like.

On top of all the Ball talk, the exchange students from Beauxbatons had arrived the day before, and now they strolled through the halls looking all too pretentious in their contrasting pale blue uniforms. Murphy was sure to send them scowls everytime they looked his way, just so they knew how unpleased he was with their presence.

Needless to say, it had been a stressful three days for him. His head was constantly spinning with the pressure of the Ball, and more importantly how to ask Emori to it, and all he wanted to do right now was go straight to his dorm and take a nap.

“Murphy, wait up!”

He was starting to think he had some sort of curse.

Seeing Raven approaching in his peripheral vision, Murphy slowed down to let her catch up with him. Out of all the people that could have interrupted his plans right now, she was definitely not the worst.

Murphy had known Raven Reyes for, very literally, as long as he could remember. They used to hate each other’s guts, something each of their parents found endlessly amusing, but after Raven’s dad left and her mom began neglecting her, she ended up in foster care, where Murphy would end up only two years after her. 

Now, the two were decently close friends, and he at least knew her well enough to know she wouldn’t start gossiping about the ball to him.

“So, you thinking about who you’re gonna ask to the Ball?”

Intuition wasn’t Murphy’s strong suit, apparently.

He shrugged as nonchalantly as he could, keeping his eyes trained ahead of him. “Not really. Probably no one.”

Raven snorted. “Is ‘no one’ code for Emori?”

Murphy shot her an annoyed look, but started to wonder just how obvious his feelings for her were. Did Emori know about them already? If she did, then why wouldn’t she have said anything? Perhaps she simply didn’t feel the same way about him… 

“Whatever,” he grumbled, eager to change the subject as they turned into one of the bigger hallways, which was currently packed with students standing idly around in groups and sitting on the floor against the walls. “What about you? You gonna ask anyone?” 

She chuckled slightly, as if it was crazy for him to suggest such a thing. “Nope. Don’t have anyone to ask even if I wanted to.”

Murphy smirked in disbelief. “Well what about-”

“If you say Finn, you’re dead.”

Laughing, he recalled all the times he had teased her about the massive crush Finn Collins obviously had on her. Murphy had stopped doing that last year, though, when it was clear it was getting on her nerves. He did not want to get on her bad side.

“I was _gonna_ say that Hufflepuff girl you’re always staring at.”

Raven’s face glowed bright red. “I- What? There’s no- I don’t-” Her words trailed off as she stumbled. “Me and Luna are just friends.”

Almost on cue, Murphy spotted a wisp of wild red hair on the other side of the hall. “Perfect. There she is now.”

“Murphy, I swear to-”

“Hey, Luna!” Murphy called out across the hall, laughing at Raven’s protest and blushing face.

Except for Raven’s obvious crush on her, Murphy didn’t actually know Luna that well. The only time he had really spoken to her was when he was paired with her for an herbology project in first year, which she did most of the work for. 

Now, she approached them slowly, as if taking her time to examine every sight around her. She was very strange, Murphy thought, but clearly Raven saw something in her, if her bulging eyes were any indication.

“Hello, John.” Luna said in a calm voice, but she wasn’t looking at him. “Hey, Raven.”

Murphy was sure he had never seen Raven this nervous in his entire life, her fidgeting and fumbling words a perfect foil to Luna’s relaxed atmosphere. He wondered if he was going to be like that with Emori.

“Hey, Luna. I, uh-” She looked to Murphy for guidance. He had none.

“Well, I better be getting to class,” Murphy smirked, beginning to walk in the direction of his common room. “You two have fun!”

Raven looked as if she could kill him in that moment. “Murphy- you don’t have class right now!” 

He didn’t respond, just winked at her and turned the corner, leaving them completely to themselves. Matchmaking for Raven wasn’t on his schedule for today, but if she gets a date and he gets to go to his dorm and take a nap, it was worth the screaming he was going to be hearing later.

Peeking around the corner for just a moment, he watched his friend pull at her robes and smile affectionately at the red haired girl, who was beaming back at her. Murphy could only hope it would go half as well with Emori, especially since he had the advantage- or disadvantage, he thought grimly- of already being close friends with her. 

Upon entering the Slytherin common room, Murphy was just about ready to scream when he saw his group of friends lounging on a couch right beside the door to the boys’ dormitory. Was a nap really too much to ask for?

Walking slowly with his head faced in another direction, he attempted to sneak past his friends just to get to the door, hoping once it was open he could just sprint to his bed and collapse. This plan failed quickly.

“Hey, Murphy,” called Miller as he passed by the couch. “Come sit down, man, Josie was just about to tell us something.”

Murphy groaned and slumped next to Bellamy on the couch in surrender, Miller and Mbege sitting on top of the backrest. His friend smiled at his arrival, but appeared stiff. This seemed to be a recurring theme for the last few days, Murphy thought.

Ever since Bellamy stormed out of the Great Hall after the assembly, he had been acting different, notably more distant towards Murphy. It just didn’t make sense to him at all. He knew that Bellamy didn’t like Emori, but would he really be this upset at him asking her to the ball? His friend had always been so supportive of him, always there to help him, always by his side. Now, Murphy could feel him pulling away, and he didn’t even know why. 

The thought of losing Bellamy sent a cold rush straight down his spine. Murphy returned his smile, trying to make him feel the genuinity of it. His friend looked away, focusing his eyes on the girl perched on the opposite arm of the couch. Sighing, Murphy followed his gaze to Josephine.

“You guys will not believe who I just saw Clarke talking to,” she said in her usual gossipy voice, though she sounded angry about something.

“Please, enlighten us,” Murphy deadpanned, leaning his head on Bellamy’s shoulder wearily. Where his friend would usually laugh at his whininess and ruffle his hair, Bellamy shrugged his head off of his shoulder tensely. Murphy frowned at him, but his gaze was left unmet.

Josephine shot Murphy an unamused look, shifting her words towards the other boys. “I was walking back down from the North towers this morning, and I saw Clarke talking to someone right there on the staircase. So I went to go meet up with her, only to find she was totally flirting with _Lexa_.”

Murphy’s eyes rolled to the back of his head at his friends’ over dramatic reactions to the news. He wasn’t surprised- most of the Slytherins hated Lexa- but it would’ve been nice if he was sleeping right now instead of listening to pointless gossip.

It was pretty ridiculous, in his opinion, to persecute someone for speaking to Lexa, on the simple basis that there wasn’t a single person in Hogwarts who didn’t know her- regardless of any hatred. He had even seen her and Emori talking on more than one occasion.

Lexa Woods was the daughter of the current Minister of Magic, Titus Woods, who had been in office since before Lexa was even born. This was much to the chagrin of Josephine’s father Russell Lightbourne, the Minister’s second in command who had been trying to snag the position for just as long. The Woods/Lightbourne feud created strong tensions between Gryffindor and Slytherin- the houses the families were loyal to, respectively- and other wizarding families that were loyal to each house, including most of his friends’ families.

Personally, Murphy had no problem with Lexa. She seemed as nice as anyone else, if not more, many times lending him a quill in class without him asking, or laughing at the little quips he made about professors under his breath. He also had no choice but to get along with Clarke; her family was close to his adoptive one, and she herself was good friends with Wells. He couldn’t even imagine the lecture Jaha would give him if he found out he was being shitty to Clarke just because she spoke to Lexa, especially because of his support of the Woods administration. 

As Josephine and his friends ranted about the situation, Murphy got up from the couch to finally go to the dormitory. He nudged at Bellamy, who was actually participating in the conversation, and gestured for him to come to the dorm with him. But instead of following, Bellamy just shook his head and turned back to the others. Sighing, Murphy pushed the dormitory door open and started for his bed.

Bellamy was in some kind of personal funk, Murphy decided, like the one he himself was in when his parents died. As he lay in bed staring up at the ceiling, he wondered what exactly was happening with his friend. Everything had seemed fine at his house the last time he visited, but then again looks could be deceiving. Surely everything looked fine with Murphy while his mother was drinking herself sick every night. He thought about asking Bellamy’s sister Octavia if there was anything bad going on, knowing that Bellamy himself would never give him a straight answer.

Whatever it was, his friend clearly didn’t want his help, just like how Murphy didn’t want help when he was having issues. As his eyes grew heavy and he began drifting to sleep, Murphy could only hope that Bellamy would find someone like Emori- someone who could pull him out from the darkness.

-

There was a little over one week left until the Ball, and Murphy had a plan.

Setting the last pot of flowers on one of the tables of the empty study hall, he grinned to himself at just how perfect this was going to be. The study hall was the place he had asked her to be his friend, and tonight, it would be the place he would ask her to the Yule Ball. And from there, perhaps be even more than friends.

He had adorned the large room with candles and flowers he had stolen from the herbology greenhouse (most likely an unwise decision based on the fact Murphy hadn’t once paid attention in herbology), and he was wearing the jumper she always said she liked because it “made him look like a person”. Murphy laughed at the memory, but nervously pulled on the edges of the thing as he awaited her arrival.

A few hours ago when they had been studying together, he had slipped a note into the pocket of her robes telling her to meet him here at six o’clock. It was currently five fifty-four, and his heart was beating so quickly he thought it might fly right out of his chest.

The doors swung open right on time, revealing Emori, who giggled confusedly when she saw him and the setup of the room. Murphy laughed along with her, feeling a sense of apprehension wash over his face and down his spine. 

“John… What is this?” She approached the table he was leaning against warily, but he didn’t miss the small smile painting her face.

Matching it, Murphy reached for his back pocket to feel for the last piece of his plan: a single rose. A little cheesy, yes, but definitely romantic. 

“Emori, I like you. And- look, I know I’ve never been perfect, or even close, but… you make me wanna be. And we’ve been through so much and survived so much…” 

Pulling out the rose, he held it out in front of him expectantly. She stared at it, and back at him, appearing absolutely dumbfounded by his speech and the gesture.

He took a step closer to her. “So what do you say? Will you go to the Yule Ball with me?”

He knew his eyes must have been cascaded with hope and sentiment, but her expression was unreadable. For a moment, Murphy thought he had made a mistake. Of course she didn’t feel the same way about him. He ruined everything. Their friendship was over.

That moment passed. And then her face flushed crimson and her eyes were twinkling like a little kid as she plucked the rose from his hand and twirled it in her fingers a little. Emori smirked and bit her lip, bringing the flower to her face so she could bury her nose in it and hide her smile. Even if she rejected him right now, this adorable sight would have made it worth it for Murphy.

“The Yule Ball, huh?” She was clearly beaming, but kept her mysterious ambience in full effect as she took a step towards him. “I think I can fit that into my schedule.” 

Murphy must have been grinning like an idiot, but he didn’t care. They were close right now- probably the closest they’ve ever been without hugging- and he had never kissed anyone before, but he thought maybe he wanted to kiss her. Figuring he definitely shouldn’t test his luck right now, Murphy instead pulled her into a hug, to which Emori laughed and wrapped her arms around his waist.

They’ve come so far together, Murphy thought as he rested his chin on her shoulder and breathed in the smell of her hair. A few years ago she was scared of them even touching hands, and now she trusted him enough to let him embrace her and take her to a ball. The thought was enough to make his heart melt.

They pulled away, and Emori scanned the room with a raised eyebrow. “Do you need help cleaning all this up?”

He shrugged. “Nah, let’s leave it. I stole them all from herbology, anyway. Someone’ll find them and bring them back eventually.”

They shared a chuckle at that, Murphy taking out his wand and blowing out all the candles as they exited the study hall. 

“One problem,” Emori said as they approached the Slytherin common room, breaking the sweet silence they had maintained on their walk back. “I don’t have anything to wear.”

Murphy actually sighed a breath of relief that this was her concern, because he already had a plan for this one. Still, he saw her insecurities glazing over her eyes as she brought it up, so he was quick to reassure her.

“Don’t worry about that, trust me.” He held the common room door open for her after reciting the password, a gesture that Emori always found amusing for some reason.

She cocked her head in disapproval. “You can’t just say that about everything and expect me to go along with it.”

“Can too,” he quipped with a wink. 

He watched in affection as Emori rolled her eyes at him, and then proceeded to navigate through the buzzing common room to collect the bag she had left there before their meeting. Meeting back up with him by the door to the girls’ dormitory, she smirked slightly.

“See you tomorrow, John.” Hesitation washed over Emori’s face for half a second, and was then claimed by confidence as she rose to her tippy toes and placed a quick kiss to Murphy’s cheek.

His face was hot in a glowing blush, and he barely registered the wink she sent his way as she disappeared into her dormitory. Murphy stood there for a moment, absolutely dizzy but undeniably exhilarated by this development. 

When he laid down in bed later that night, it was with an ear to ear grin adhered to his face, and- he’ll admit- a small scream into his pillow.

-

Still living off his victory from last night, Murphy strolled into his Transfiguration class early with a clear goal and nothing in his way. Yeah, maybe he had acted a little cocky all morning, but hey, he had something to be happy about. All he had to do was sort out this one last detail, and he was golden for the Ball next Saturday.

The one hitch in following through with his final plan was that to do so, he had to talk to one of his least favourite people to hold a conversation with. It would be a little uncomfortable, he reasoned, but Murphy didn’t have a doubt in his mind she’d go through with it. And if she didn’t, there was always blackmail.

Clarke Griffin was already seated at her desk when he walked in, which made it easy for Murphy to take a seat backwards in the chair in front of her, trying for casual. She looked up from the parchment that she had been doodling a pretty realistic sketch of Lexa on.

“Something you need?” Clarke deadpanned.

“Yep. I’m calling in a favour.”

She raised her eyebrows, unimpressed. “I don’t owe you a favour.”

Smirking, Murphy leaned forward onto her desk to speak in a more private tone. “Then I guess you wouldn’t mind if I head down to the hospital wing and tell Nurse Abby what you and Wells did last yea-”

“What do you want, Murphy?”

His plan was falling right into place. “Are you going dress shopping in Hogsmeade this weekend for the Ball?”

Clarke appeared confused by why he was asking her this, but answered anyway. “I mean, yeah, I have to. Josephine’s not letting me wear one of hers anymore. Why?”

“It would suck for you to have to go dress shopping all alone for an iconic ball like this, wouldn’t it?”

She quirked an eyebrow. “What, you wanna come with me?”

“Close,” Murphy replied nonchalantly. “Take Emori with you.”

Clarke’s response was not nonchalant. “What?! You know I can’t do that, Josephine is-”

“Already mad at you. And also a bitch,” he threw in, just for fun really. “Listen, you’re lonely, Mori’s in need of a dress too, just ask her to go with you. It’ll be fun.”

“Why can’t you go with her, then?” Clarke asked, looking actually curious.

“Because she made me swear I wouldn’t buy things for her anymore. I’ll give you the money for it, just act like you’re buying it for her ‘cause you feel bad for being friends with the devil. Problem solved.”

She hesitated for a few seconds, and Murphy thought he was gonna have to bring his threat back up, but then she finally said, “Okay, I’ll do it.”

Murphy grinned and thanked her, getting up to go find a seat at his own desk. 

“Hey, Murphy?” Clarke called out just as he was turning away. “Just so you know, I do feel bad about being friends with Josie.”

“Don’t we all?”

-

When he entered the Great Hall on the fateful Saturday night of the Yule Ball, Murphy could hardly recognize it. The place looked magnificent, all adorned in icy blue, with each of the tall windows given a bright, snowy sheen, and large Christmas trees set up around the perimeter. He couldn’t believe that it was the same place he had eaten breakfast just that morning.

The entire center of the Hall was open and cleared for dancing, but there were round tables circling the dance floor. Murphy trailed behind Bellamy to go take a seat at one.

He had tried several times over the course of the week to ask Bellamy what the problem was, but he simply brushed it off, claiming that nothing was wrong, that he was just bugged by all the exchange students and the over dramaticness of the Ball. Murphy was skeptical of this response, but when he asked Octavia what she thought, she only shrugged and said it was probably just puberty. That answer was much less helpful.

Now, Murphy couldn’t even focus on the boy sitting next to him, too busy fidgeting with the buttons of his shirt and checking over and over again to make sure his bowtie wasn’t crooked. He wanted to look perfect, to make her look good and not embarrass her, despite the ghastly dress robes Jaha had sent him already being bound to do that. 

Noticing Murphy’s nervousness, Bellamy put a hand on one of his, which was currently tugging at the edge of his robe. 

“You look great, don’t worry.” Bellamy’s eyes were soft in the way Murphy was always used to seeing, and he grinned, taking this as a sign things were going back to normal. 

Perhaps even better than normal after tonight, Murphy thought.

According to Emori, dress shopping with Clarke had actually been fun, though she wasn’t entirely convinced that he had nothing to do with it. The punishment that her suspicions warranted for him was that he wasn’t allowed to see the dress she had gotten until today. It really shouldn’t have affected him that much, yet here he was craning his neck to scan the entry of the Hall for his date, wearing a dress she had picked out herself, after kissing him on the cheek. She was clearly trying to kill him.

The week between Murphy asking Emori to be his date to the Ball and the actual Ball wasn’t all too exciting, except for the fact that the two of them were now unquestionably flirting with each other. In perfect honesty, the flirting they had had going on over the course of the week had been rather competitive, each going to extreme lengths to tease the other and turn them as red as a tomato. In the end, there wasn’t a clear winner, but Murphy definitely intended to change that tonight.

In his examination of the crowd around the entrance of the Hall, he had not yet spotted Emori, but he did spot Clarke and Lexa holding hands near one of the Christmas trees, as well as Raven and Luna walking beside each other awkwardly, but both seemingly giggling. Raven really owed him one for that, he thought.

At this point, there weren’t many people that Murphy knew unaccounted for except for Emori, as well as-

“Hi, John.”

Why did this have to happen to him? he asked whatever higher entity was listening.

“Hi,” said Murphy stiffly, not looking at Josephine, instead keeping his eyes trained on the Hall doors. There wasn’t any point in fighting her today; Murphy already had a date, and it happily was not Josephine Lightbourne. 

She ran her finger over the sleeve of his dress robe. Did this girl never learn personal space? “You look so handsome, John. I was hoping you’d save me a dance tonight.”

Murphy shoved her hand away from him and scoffed. “Not a chance, just leave me alone.”

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Josephine look over at Bellamy, who, after following her gaze to him, was staring right at Murphy. They met eyes for a second, and his friend smiled, but in a way that felt sad, almost hopeless. Murphy hoped that even if it wasn’t with him, Bellamy was getting help for whatever problems he was having.

As they waited and Murphy stared at the entrance, he was beginning to get anxious that Emori wasn’t going to show up at all. She might have been sitting in the dorm crying in her gown while he sat there and waited for her to walk through the doors. She might have thought she wasn’t worthy of attending a ball, wasn’t worthy of being with him the way he wanted her to. The thought made his stomach turn, and he decided if she didn’t arrive in the next five minutes, he would go looking for her.

“Hey, you’re Bellamy, right?” said a voice approaching their table, effectively snapping Murphy out of his scrambled thoughts. It was one of the exchange students, a tall boy wearing a nice suit and standing in front of his friend.

Bellamy huffed. “Yeah, what’s it to you?”

Murphy watched as the other boy chuckled and pulled something out of his pocket. He immediately recognized it as Bellamy’s ring, something Octavia had made for him when they were little. Something Bellamy never took off.

“I found this on your desk when you left Charms yesterday,” the boy said, placing it in Bellamy’s hand. The curly haired boy stiffened, but wrapped his hand around the object nonetheless. Bellamy and the boy stared each other down for a moment.

“Oh. Thanks,” said Bellamy warily, his eyes still scanning him.

The boy nodded and went to turn away, but before he did, hesitated and said, “I’m Gabriel, by the way.” 

Murphy was about to introduce himself, but it seemed like this greeting was only for Bellamy, so instead he returned to his task of searching for Emori in the crowd.

After what felt like years of waiting nervously for her, in walked his date through the talls doors of the Great Hall, and Murphy’s mouth went dry at the sight of her.

Even from the distance, Emori looked like a goddess on Earth, absolutely glowing in the icy lighting of the Hall. Her dark hair flowed down her shoulders gracefully, and as she got closer Murphy could spot the intricate braids she had woven into it. The real showstopper, though, was the gown she had chosen. It was a stunning shade of blue, a colour she had never worn before but was _definitely_ one that belonged to her based off how radiant it looked on her tan skin, and the skirt of the dress puffed out just enough to give her a true princess silhouette. Not that she needed it- she looked like royalty in just about anything. Once she had approached the table, he could now see that the blue of the dress was dotted with small, golden stars, making her look absolutely ethereal.

Murphy stood up to face her, instantly going in for a hug, just to feel her close to him, to make sure she was real. Emori giggled when she pulled back, straightening his tie that had gotten crushed in the embrace.

“You are so beautiful-”

“You look incredible-”

They fell into laughter at their simultaneous compliments, and Murphy led her to come sit down at the table with him. Neither Bellamy nor Josephine looked thrilled at this development.

“Wow, Emori, you look so good,” hummed Josephine in a sickly sweet voice dripping with poison. “You are so brave to pair such a beautiful dress with your hand like that-”

“Would you just shut the fuck up?!” Murphy yelled out of pure instinct, silencing the area surrounding them.

Emori was wearing one of her unreadable faces. Murphy took her badass hand in his and pressed a soft kiss to the knuckles of it for everyone to see. Her face was much easier to read now: she looked terrified.

Josephine looked disgusted and angered at everything that just occurred, and Bellamy just looked sad- at what, he couldn’t even begin to decipher- but Murphy paid them no attention, instead taking his date’s hand and pulling her away from that cursed table, to a more peaceful corner of the ballroom.

It seemed as if only now was the Ball really starting, with music beginning to play and students crowding in the center of the dance floor to mingle and slow dance with their partners. Murphy sat with Emori silently for a few moments, before she spoke.

“Thank you, John.”

He was softened at her words, at the look in her eye, at the insecurity washing over her face that she wasn’t enough, that she didn’t deserve it. Feeling bold, Murphy reached up to touch her cheek gently, turning her jaw slightly so she was looking at him.

“I didn’t do it for show, Mori. I meant it. I always mean it.”

She nodded slowly. “I know. I didn’t mean just for that, though. For everything. For caring about me. I care about you, too, John. So much.”

Their eyes interlocked in the way they always did, and he got lost in the deep brown currents of them for longer than he could say. The strange urge to kiss her overtook him again, but he pushed it down, instead standing up and offering her his hand.

“May I have this dance, Mori?”

Emori laughed softly, but took his hand and allowed him to pull her to her feet. “You may,” she replied in an overly posh voice.

There were too many couples dancing to the soft music on the dance floor to count, but to Murphy, it was only the two of them, only her. He pulled her in close to him, placing one hand delicately on her waist while he held hers in the other. Emori’s badass hand rested on his shoulder, and she hesitated slightly, but ultimately went through with curling her head into his chest as they swayed.

They danced in silence for a while, simply enjoying each other’s company too much to break the peace, but eventually Murphy was ready to say what he needed to say. He had practiced it in the mirror all day, after all.

Pulling back slightly, he allowed her to untuck her head from his chest and look into his eyes, threatening to drown him in hers once again. Murphy smiled softly at her, at this broken girl who was dancing with a broken boy, both trying to make something of this cruel world that had turned against them. He cleared his throat.

“Emori… You must know how much I care about you, how- like- _deeply_ I care about you. To the point where I can never get you out of my head, really. You’re so amazing, Mori. So amazing, and strong, and beautiful, and- and you make me so happy. Everytime I’m with you it feels like the world is finally whole again- or something- like everything is just _right_. I- I don’t want to scare you off, I know you have a hard time trusting people, but I want to be someone you can trust. Someone you can always trust. I want to… Would you want to… Can I be your boyfriend, Mori?”

It wasn’t as elegant as he had intended it, he had stumbled over his words and probably made a complete fool of himself, but he said what he needed to say to her. All he could do now was look into the beautiful depths of her eyes and have hope for what her response could be.

It was silent once again for a few minutes. He allowed her time to think, careful not to rush her despite his own apprehension. 

In hindsight, Murphy should have known that Emori’s answer wouldn’t be with words, that words were tricky things that she wasn’t confident with. Still, he couldn’t have anticipated what happened next.

Emori’s gaze drifted from his eyes to his lips, and the next thing he knew she had closed the gap between them, kissing him softly but surely. Their lips moved together awkwardly, neither of them having any experience. Her kiss was more like individual pecks, while his own lips kept drifting to the side of her mouth and her chin. When they pulled apart, they both laughed at how horrible they were at it, but the softness in each of their eyes was enough for them not to care. They were together. A couple. The two of them against the world, just how it was always meant to be.

They only danced for a little while longer, eventually retiring to the large snack table set up, grabbing as much food as they could and bringing it with them as they exited the Great Hall to sit in the courtyard under the stars. What started as a ridiculous ball quickly became hours of grass stained formalwear, vivacious storytelling, and, obviously, sharing a lot of food. It was so perfect, so _them_ , that Murphy couldn’t help but smile.

Eventually they tried the kissing thing again, somehow shocked at how terrible they still were, but having fun nonetheless, collapsing into the grass and creating new constellations in the sky above them. 

Not a bad way to start a relationship, Murphy thought, drunk on happiness and _her_. Not bad at all.

-

Murphy was adorning an ear to ear grin as he entered the boys’ dormitory later that night, surely looking like a heap of ragged clothes and messy hair. The Ball was still raging on in the Great Hall, but the two of them had decided to go to sleep after their own fun night had come to a close.

Because of this, he had completely expected the dorm to be empty, but to his surprise, it wasn’t.

“Hey, Murph,” Bellamy said quietly, already lying in bed as he walked in.

It was the saddest Murphy had ever seen him, all alone in the silence of the room, his voice hoarse and soft and his eyes filled with sorrow. Walking over to his friend’s bed, he climbed in and laid down next to him, the way they used to when they were kids. 

They stared at the ceiling in silence for a while, Murphy sparing glances at him now and then, just to make sure he wasn’t crying, like it felt like he might.

Finally, Bellamy spoke, not shifting his gaze from the ceiling above them. “I’m so sorry, Murph.”

Murphy looked at him again, confused. “For what? You didn’t do anything, Bell.”

“Yes I did.”

His voice was laced with guilt and regret. He wouldn’t look at Murphy at all.

“You remember last year, when I tried to get you to sneak up to the kitchen with me that night?” Bellamy asked faintly. 

“Yeah, why?”

His friend swallowed. “I knew Emori was in the common room. Me and Josephine had a plan to get you two to stop being friends. We knew that you were too stubborn to break it off yourself so…”

So they tried to make Emori insecure enough that she would break them apart, he realized. Bellamy had known Murphy would lie about his intentions with her. He knew him too well.

A pang of anger hit Murphy in the chest suddenly, and he sat up and looked down at the boy who he thought was his friend. “Why the hell would you do that?” he seethed.

Bellamy mumbled something incoherent, refusing to meet his eyes, but Murphy wasn’t having it. “Tell me! Do you really hate seeing me happy that much?!”

This outburst caused Bellamy to sit up straight as well, facing his friend with tears in his eyes. Murphy was so confused, Bellamy couldn’t possibly hate Emori enough to sacrifice his happiness, right? Bellamy had always cared about his happiness.

Bellamy wouldn’t look at his friend’s face, instead focusing his eyes on the bed beneath them. “I was jealous.”

There was nothing but silence in the room for a few long moments.

“What?”

“It- It’s the same reason I got angry about the Ball after the assembly. I didn’t… The reason I didn’t want you to ask Emori to the ball was because… Was because I wanted you to ask me. I’ve wanted that since before the stupid ball even existed.”

Gears were spinning out of control in Murphy’s brain as he attempted to process what Bellamy had just said. The silence that hung between them soft, unsure, and terrifying.

“You have feelings for me?”

A nod of curly hair. 

“For how long?”

Bellamy shrugged, playing with a loose thread on his quilt. “I don’t know. Since first year, I guess… It was always just you and me. And I guess I’ve always had hope that…”

His friend finally looked up, meeting Murphy’s gaze. Both pairs of eyes were glassy with tears, neither of them knowing what to say next.

Murphy didn’t know what to do. He didn’t want to hurt his friend, but he knew that that was how this was going to end. If he had been leading him on unknowingly, it couldn’t continue any longer; in order for Bellamy to move on, they both had to be honest.

“I’m sorry, Bell, I…”

“I know.”

The two boys laid back down on the bed next to each other as they had before, but a different weight pressed them down this time. Once again they stared up at the ceiling, searching for answers in a sea of questions and insecurities.

“Bell, you know I love you, right?”

“I know.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi again guys!! I really hope you all enjoyed chapter 4, I had so much fun writing it and incorporating new characters into it, so I hope you all liked my interpretations of them, because you’ll be seeing more of them as the story progresses. 
> 
> Also, this chapter is basically the halfway point of the story (since chapter 9 will be an epilogue) so I just wanted to say how absolutely grateful I am for all the amazing support I’ve gotten on this story. All you guys’ feedback and comments mean so much to me (even though I get too nervous to respond to comments most of the time so I just stare at them for hours and yell at myself for being rude and not responding lmao)
> 
> See you guys next week for chapter 5!

**Author's Note:**

> Hi it’s me again!! I hope you enjoyed the first chapter. I’m going to try to post a chapter every Sunday so hopefully that will give you something to look forward to during the week.
> 
> There’s going to be a total of 9 chapters in this fic, and each one is going to cover an entire year of Hogwarts (Year 7 is split up into 2 parts + an epilogue), so the next time you see Murphy and Emori they will be in their second year.
> 
> Once again, I hope you enjoyed!!


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